10 In our Element
by selfless1978
Summary: Two groups, so different, yet so similar. This is the story of how they came together. Co-written with Autobot Aftershock
1. Chapter 1

Like it has done countless other times, night began to settle over the city. The eerie glow of dusk began to settle into the deep velvet black, punctured with tiny white dots of starlight. The city never slowed down in this transition from day to night. The busy bustle of the streets never slowed and wouldn't anytime soon. Also not a first here for this city never seemed to settle down. The streets were filled with noisy, honking vehicles as the impatient drivers in them wanted to get to their destinations and the sidewalks were filled with walkers as they made their way much slower to their destinations. Or faster depending on how bad the traffic was stuck.

On a lower level the subway still ran on it's set schedule, the trains rumbling along their tracks and setting tremors into motion that scared the more timid rats that infested these lower travel ways back into their holes. Only when the loud behemoths passed them and continued on did they come back out on their search for food, their noses twitching as they tried to sniff out dangers, and something yummy to eat.

And in the sewers the water still ran along the bottom of the tunnels. Following a path unchanged since these tunnels had been built and put into use. Trash and debris, most of it discared carelessly in the streets above before it was washed down here, still floated idly down these subterranean waterways as the caretakers of these tunnels still made their routine rounds to make sure these filthy rivers still worked the way they were supposed to.

But in the city that never changes, there was a change that no one really noticed. Except for the underworld. But the fear of a possible return to the norm kept them in check, for now. It's silent guardians that had watched over this city for many years were not to be found, and not because they were hiding in the shadows. It had been months now since they left their underground home.

No more did the alarms go off in the lair, Donnie had turned them off. No more did they rush out the door at odd hours to deal with the latest crisis. No more did they spend hours several nights a week patrolling the rooftops.

That part really didn't bother Leo as he sat in the living area, attempting to read a book. He had read quite a few of them since he and his brothers retired and settled down. He had thought that he would enjoy being able to sit down and read them now that he had the time to do so. The book was closed with a sigh before he placed it onto the coffee table. Leo just couldn't give it his full attention.

Truth be told, it was too still for him to read. There was no loud music blaring in his ears. The video games hadn't been pulled out much lately, because most of the ones who played them weren't here to compete with each other over the high scores. The tv itself was now set to a tolerable volume level, and wasn't playing one of those actioned packed explosive movies. There were no spats, squabbles or arguments over who got to play or watch what. No impromptu training sessions caused by one tackling the other, sending both hunter and hunted rolling across the floor. No youthful bodies hopping and flipping over the furniture when they could have just walked around. No piles of empty pizza boxes, precarious balanced towers of dirty dishes and half empty chip bags lying in wait under a couch cushion for an unsuspecting Leo to sit on and crunch. No popcorn being thrown at each other during movie night, not that they were watching the movie anyway over the horseplay. In short, there were no children.

They were living their own life now, and living it away from home. They had found a place to stay that accepts them, and even ones who love them. Leo should be thrilled that their life took such a turn, but he could not get used to this empty nest feeling. He couldn't even enjoy time with Dennis and Amy because they had been called to their grandparents in Louisiana to help with some chores that their Pawpaw couldn't do on his own anymore. And Leo had no clue really when they would be coming back. None of the children he raised were home, and it was bothering him very much.

Vicky walked into the living area, her brown eyes looking thoughtful at the turtle who shared her life before she walked over and sat down next to him on the couch. "You've been awfully quiet lately."

His blue eyes traveled the now so empty lair. "I miss them." He said simply. "I just can't get used to how quiet it is now with them gone."

"And here I was thinking you would enjoy the peace and quiet."

"I enjoy the presence of my children more." Leo let out a quiet sigh as he leaned into the couch and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "I'm not so sure I like this change." At least he still had her in his life. That in itself was a blessing he would never take for granted again. Not after the last fiasco that had forced them into retirement.

Mikey came running by, his eyes wide with fright. "Leo! Heeeeelp!"

The reason for his terrified expression came running by right behind him. "You little pain in my ass!" Raph bellowed. "I'll teach you to put tacks in my bed!"

And barely a moment later Cris joined in the chase, her hanbo already out and ready to use. "Come here you shithead! How about I drop your ass on them!"

Leo and Vicky just quietly watched them all run by, one after the other.

"Then again..." Vicky shook her head. "There are some things that never change..."

Leo just rolled his eyes at that as he got up off of the couch and went to go save his little brother from his current predicament.

The commotion this fiasco caused actually caught Donnie's attention enough to where he appeared out of his lab with Marina. He watched what was going on with raised eyeridges a moment before he spoke. "I know you said it would be good for us to retire and all Leo...but I think the forced inactivity is getting to some of us."

Marina crossed her arms, her head shaking at yet another Mikey caused disturbance. Which have been getting progressively worse. "You think? Cait can't even keep him out of trouble anymore."

Leo didn't answer, he was to busy tossing Cris to the couch where she landed into a sitting position on the cushion. She bounced a few times as Leo turned to try and wrestle Raph off of a squealing Mikey. He finally had to resort to grabbing the larger turtles shell and pulled back very hard, causing his red masked brother to go rolling backwards along the floor. At least his grip was finally off of Mikey, but it had taken Leo more effort that usual to separate the two.

Vicky rubbing her forehead, also clearly frustrated. "I think it's time we all got out of the lair for a bit. We've hardly done anything since we got home."

"And what exactly did you plan on us doing?" Leo almost snapped, a combination of unhappiness over the empty lair and his own frustration eating at him. "I told you we need to lay low. We've caused enough of a stir having to go dragon in public."

"Oh come on... I didn't say go out and and kick thugs up and down the street. Just a little rooftop run. Donnie is right, some of us are starting to go stir crazy down here." She looked pointedly at Raph, Mikey and Cris. "And it won't be too much longer before the furniture starts to suffer for it. It has a bad habit of flying around and crashing into walls when this family gets pissed enough."

Leo looked over his family. He hated to admit it, but they were right. For years they had gone out on a regular basis and had never gone this long without going topside for patrol. It was then he realized that he wasn't the only one having a hard time adjusting to the forced inactivity and quiet home. It was getting to all of them which was causing tempers, and mischievousness in Mikey, to flare up. This wasn't exactly what he wanted their life to be like either. He gave in with a deep sigh. "Fine... But I want it clearly understood that we are not going out to look for trouble. A short run, that's it."

He was immediately rewarded with excited, almost childlike grins on the faces of his family members.

"Can Cait come too?" Mikey asked. "It just doesn't seem right to leave her behind. There really isn't a reason for her to stay and she'd be here all by herself."

"Yes Mikey, she can come if she wants."

His little brother let out an excited whoop and ran off to go find his wife, then came back just a few moments later dragging her by the arm. She was looking at him with her own look of exasperation and somehow Leo knew that even her unlimited patience was wearing thin with the prankster. Apparently Mikey didn't tell her _why_ he was dragging her around the lair like a ragdoll.

The blue masked leader of this rambunctious group decided to take pity on the poor woman before Mikey pulled her arm out of her socket. "We are going topside Caitlin. And you are more than welcome to come join us if you wish."

Even she lost her grumpy face and a smile took it's place. "If it's not too much trouble. I know I'm not as good as that rooftop hopping as the rest of you." She laughed a little. "Heck, even Amy is better at it than I am."

Leo gave her an encouraging smile. "It's fine Cait. We'll help you along. Mikey does have a point, there is no need to leave you here all by yourself."

"Then I would love to come!" Her green eyes were now sparkling with excitement.

"Go get ready. All of you." Those few words sent his family scurrying in all kinds of directions. The women to go get changed and the turtles gearing up, out of habit. Even on a short fun run they knew better than to go out unprepared.

It took them all less than half an hour to meet back up by the door, and the grumpy, tense mood that had hung in the lair like a cloud of doom was already lifting as the bickering had turned into playful banter.

"Can we go see April and Casey?" Mikey asked hopefully. "We swapped movies and I'd like to bring back the ones I borrowed."

"Yes Mikey." Leo began to walk to the door.

"Id like to swing by the junk yard if it's not too much trouble." Donnie said. "It's been awhile since I've been able to scavenge for decent parts. Still have a few repairs left to do on the van."

"Of course." Leo opened the door and his family began to file out.

"There is that new blade shop that opened up a couple streets over from the junk yard." Raph mused. "I'd like to scope it out if we have time."

"I'm sure we can fit it in." Leo followed his family out and firmly closed the door behind him and the echo of it sounded out into a now very quiet lair.


	2. Chapter 2

The cool night air felt good as it pressed against my skin and through my braided hair. A wide smile was plastered on my face as I somersaulted forward, clearing a gap between two buildings before I landed in a forward roll. I came back to my feet, utterly delighted to be back out after months of inactivity. Leo ran along side me now, his own face sporting a smile as he set me up for another leap. The tension I saw on his face earlier this evening was gone and I could feel that he was beginning to enjoy himself. A lot.

After the Unicron incident, things took a turn in the abnormal for us. Our routine severely shaken up. First we spent months helping the bots to rebuild the base that was pretty much destroyed in the fight with the Heralds of Unicron. Only a few structures had remained standing, and they were very unstable. The whole place had to be rebuilt practically from the ground up. Took quicker than we expected it would to get it running to where the guys felt it was ok for us to return home. What was left to do was just minor fine tuning on all the systems and what not, and the bots could handle that on their own.

But in leaving, we also left our children behind. Each now grown turtle tot had found someone they had connected with. Not willing to rip the humans from their chosen profession at NEST, nor to settle on a long distance relationship with them, the teens had decided to stay on the base with their mates. And they were welcomed with open arms. Will, Epps and Prime all were happy to have the capable teens under their, unofficial, command. They existed there as ghosts. Not officially on the government payroll and they had been given their own tech by Donnie that they had linked into the bot's systems and by the time we headed for home, they were fully integrated into the NEST team. Heck, they accepted their first mission even as we rolled out towards home, towing the still not completely fixed up van.

And when we did get home, Leo enforced the decision he made. The guys settled down into their retirement. I understood why he decided on this, and he was in a way right. They still had the ability to turn into dragons and sooner or later one of them would get frustrated or tempted and turn into that large, graceful...and very hard to hide, dragon. That in return would bring who knows how many monster hunters in the city to look for them. That didn't mean the decision sat well with them. As we found out earlier, the forced inactivity was starting to unravel them, and us, a bit. The run tonight was actually doing us all a world of good.

"I have to admit...I did miss this..." Leo told me as we landed together. His blue eyes sparkling in the night.

I laughed in my own enjoyment, both at being out and his better mood. "You've been doing it for so long, you just can't turn it off Leo."

I got a rueful shrug as an answer.

"Hey!" Caitlin called from behind us. "Wait up a minute!"

"Why? What's up?" I asked as we all skidded to a stop.

Caitlin was leaning over the side of the building we were on, looking intently down to the street before she pointed. "Nothing. I just want to go look at something is all."

I walked curiously over to see what had her attention, and rolled my eyes. "Really..." I asked her in a flat tone as I looked away from the bridal store and back to her. "Come on Cait. I don't think any of them are ready for that just yet."

Her delicate face took on a pouting expression. "I just want to look..."

The quiet chuckle Leo let out told me he fell for that look. "Go with her. We'll wait up here."

I rolled my eyes again and we dropped down with Caitlin. She let out this annoying girly squeal as she ran towards the large display window. Immediately she started gushing over everything she saw. And had to look at every single piece. "Oh! That dress would look lovely on Ari..." She pointed excitedly.

Cris groaned slightly as she walked over at a much slower pace.

"And that veil is so pretty!" Cait gushed next, her hands pressed to the window and her face almost smushed up against it.

Marina sighed as she stepped off of the street we crossed and up onto the curb.

"And look at those shoes!"

"Oh good god..." I muttered, rubbing my face.

Cris walked over to me and placed her elbow on my shoulder and leaned on me as we waited as Caitlin made her way slowly down the window. "And what about this one! Oh that tiara..."

"Anyone else already feeling sorry for Ari and Adam?" Marina asked calmly as she crossed her arms. Cris snickered as I tried not to roll my eyes again.

"I don't think we'll have to worry about bridezilla." I dryly replied. "It's momzilla who is-" I cut myself off. Something else had gotten my attention. The slightly amused sensation I was getting from Leo turned into shock, then anger before he just...turned off... I couldn't feel him anymore. My head snapped around to the rooftop they had been waiting on even as Caitlin and Marina did the same.

"I can't feel them..." Cait said quietly as her eyes went up. Marina nodded her agreement.

I was moving back across the street before she even finished, cursing violently as I did.

They were right on my tail as I frantically ran up the fire escape and we all skidded to a stop in shock to find an empty rooftop. The four turtles who should have been there, weren't. The only thing we found were their weapons scattered all over the roof.

.

.

Leo opened his eyes and didn't like the situation he found himself in. He was strapped down, front first on a metal table. His arms extended out in front of him and his legs were also held tightly down. Confusion hit him a moment before everything came flooding back into his mind. One moment they were watching Caitlin, enjoying her excitement as she dreamed for what she hoped for would be the next step in her daughter's relationship, the next there had been a net thrown over him. A net that had been stronger than his attempts to get out of it, and it was encrusted with odd looking crystals. Crystals that burned him where they touched. The fully covered men then promptly unarmed the four of them before grabbing hold of the furious turtles, hitting something on their belts and somehow zapped them all to this place. Then Leo had been sedated.

Now he was lying on what he fully realized was an experient table. And he knew because he had seen to many in his life for his liking. Leo ignored the burning sensation that came from the areas he was strapped down at and began to furiously struggle.

"What the hell!" Raph roared, letting Leo know he was also awake. But Leo couldn't see him. Where ever he was, it wasn't in Leo's line of sight. The sounds of Raph jerking at his own restraints then met Leo's ears. "Somebody better get me off of this damn thing!"

"Yeah!" Mikey agreed, a hint of anger in his voice. "So not cool dudes!"

"But yet very amusing all the same to watch you four struggle." A smug voice replied.

Leo stopped, his eyes wide as he listened. He knew that voice, and it was one he thought he would never hear again. "Bishop..." He snarled.

"You should be rotting in hell!" A furious Raph snapped, his anger picking up.

"I should be yes, but I'm not." The smirking black clad man walked now into Leo's view, eyeballing the turtle with undisguised hatred. "You and your family have a lot to answer for."

"As do you." Leo snapped back, once again jerking on his restraints. This time he hissed in pain as they burned deeper into his wrists.

"I think I already paid my price." Bishop replied, his eyes narrowing. "And now it's time to pay yours." A scalpel he held in his hand was brought into view. "You will now serve me."

"The hell we will!" This from the normally calm Donnie.

Leo tried to reach into himself, to pull out the dragon that hid deep within as a last ditch effort to free himself, and was shocked when he felt the connection he needed blocked from him. A very desperate Leonardo once again pulled at his restraints that refused to budge and held him firmly in place.

"Exactly, it will be hell for you, but you will." That evil gleam Leo had seen so many times came into Bishop's eyes. "You will serve me and do as I wish you to do." He stepped closer to Leo, hitting a hidden button on the table and a band snapped out to hold the thrashing head into place. "And by the time your family finds you, all they will be able to do is watch as I order you to tear them to pieces. That is a worthy enough reward for putting up with your meddling all those years."

"No!" Leo growled out one last time before the sting of the scalpel cut into the back of his neck.

"Oh yes." Leo barely heard him through the pain. "I will turn you against your own family, and there will be nothing you can do about it."

.

.

"What do you mean you can't feel them!" I thundered at the two turtle trackers. "They have to be here somewhere!"

"Just that!" Marina snapped back. "They are nowhere in this area!"

"Or they are shielded." Caitlin said in a defeated tone as Cris drove the older van around the city for the countless time. "It's not the first time that's happened."

"Then you would be able to sniff out the boarders of the shield like you did last time!" I snipped. I was tired, hungry, frustrated and worried to no end. We had been on the move for hours trying to find them. Only taking short breaks at home to rest a little, eat a few bites while Marina and Caitlin tried to use Donnie's various computers to try and track something down. But even as well as those two knew him, they weren't Donnie and couldn't find anything. That in return led us back to the streets again to do it the old fashioned way.

I don't know how we kept this hectic pattern up for over a day now. And I also didn't know how much longer we could keep it up. All I could say with determination was that we weren't going to just give up and hope they make it back on their own. We left notes every time we went out, just in case they did show up. But so far? Nothing. It was like the earth had swallowed them whole and refused to spit them back out.

Caitlin was on the verge of tears now. a combination of her own worry and my harsh tone eating at her. I suddenly felt like such a damn heel as I looked at her. She was trying just as hard as the rest of us. "Caitlin, I'm sorry hon. I really am."

She didn't answer but laid a hand on my arm as Cris guided the van down another road, hoping that this one would give us some kind of lead. It didn't.


	3. Chapter 3

Titian sat in the new rec room, his feet casually on the low table in front of him as he bantered with Blaster who was sitting in one of the bot sized chairs nearby. The grey masked turtle felt at ease here, almost as much as he did at home. Of course the red haired Cindy might have a large part to do with that. She was the reason he chose to stay here, and she was also the one that made his homesickness bearable. Even after all the time he had spent here on this base, he still missed his parents, aunts and uncles.

He held firm though. The young leader of this group of walking terrapins still held the strong belief that it was time for them to live on their own, to make their own choices. His father couldn't shield him forever.

"No way." Ty disagreed with the red bot. "That songs sucks ass."

"It does not! It's very emotional."

"If you're high on drugs or something." A derisive snort sounded out of the twenty one year old. "It sounds like a banshee trying to scream for your soul."

"You just have no taste for music." Blaster grinned at him as he leaned back into the massive chair.

"Heavy metal is not music. It's a bunch of adult infants smashing pots and pans together." Ty crossed his arms as he made his point.

Blaster bust out laughing as Ty wagged his ridges at the bot.

The sister to this heavy metal hating young adult quietly entered the room. Ty looked at Lavi a bit concerned, her face was a bit pale he noticed. And her hands were shaking slightly. "What's wrong with you? You feeling ok?"

"My stomach has been feeling off all day." She quietly replied as she walked deeper into the room.

"You better let Tony check you out. Ratchet is still at that base in Hawaii."

Now she looked a little nervous as she stopped next to the couch. "I...ah...already did..."

"And? You caught a bug?"

His sister took a deep breath then and let it shakily back out. "More like a five month parasite..."

The vapid stare her brother gave her told Lavi quite clearly it was taking a minute for what she was telling him to sink in.

"I've been trying to call home..." She shook her head in mild frustration. "But no one is picking up."

Ty still just stared at her

"Will you stop staring at me like that!" Lavi finally snapped at her befuddled twin.

Ty shook himself out of his stupor. "They are probably on the farm dealing with the goats. I'm sure you'll get in touch with them later." He then gave her a wide grin. "You sure though?"

"Tony is." She replied with a small smile. "He wanted me to get Uncle Donnie to be certain."

"You tell Kyle yet?"

Now her expression went from a mild happy one to mild exasperation. "Yes." She flatly told him. "And Tony had to pick him up off of the floor."

The rec room was suddenly filled with the howling sounds of the two males as they took a vast amount of amusement from that.

"It's not funny!" Lavi fumed, which only made them laugh harder.

The only thing that cut off their laughter was Will as he came running into the room, his face even paler than Lavi's had been and a wild look in his wide eyes. "Please tell me I'm wrong..." The normally composed officer was struggling hard to hold onto his composure as he looked to them for answers they didn't even know the question to. Will just lifted the remote to the large tv off of the table Ty still had his feet on top of and turned it on, then switched it to a national news channel.

Ty shot to his feet at the images he saw flashing across the screen under the red and white "Breaking News" banner that scrolled across the top. The blood drained from his face and his heart dropped in his chest. Lavi walked closer to stand next to him, her hand covering her mouth and her eyes tearing up at what she was seeing. Their father, in dragon form, fully visible as he tore into a warehouse, took something from it, and flew off. And he left nothing but flames and rubble behind.

.

.

Jessica looked across the hot dunes. Man it was a nice day, you'd think that would be typical in Idaho on a seemingly endless stretch of sand. But you had hailstorms randomly in some seasons, and it was like, huge hail chunks not your average tiny sphere of frozen water. The brown haired girl sat on her custom, green, Kawasaki 700, watching her cousins play a game on their own quads, one they always played while out here. Leaning forward on the handlebars, the quad wasn't on, she was just enjoying the heat and fresh air.

It had been a year and a half since anything hectic happened, and Jessica has to admit, it was so freaking nice having downtime for the first time in so long. Megan pulled up beside her on a yellow dirt bike, leaning to one side so she could stop and looked at her cousin.

"You ok?"

"I am more than ok, this is the longest peace time we have gotten in god knows how long." Jess smiled. Megan grinned at her, it was kind of hard to see through the blue tinted goggles and her helmet, but Jessica knew it was there.

"Even Maranda admitted that the downtime was nice, besides training." Yeah, when Maranda even admitted the downtime was nice? You knew they were all about due for some non fighting downtime. Jessica stared out blankly, not going unnoticed by her blonde cousin.

"There is something else, all the people you have lost?" She asked, concerned. Jessica winced at that, though that wasn't her reasoning for feeling a little uneasy.

"No, just an uneasy feeling." She didn't say that statement very loud and how Maranda heard it over the roar of the quads and the distance was beyond the young woman.

"I hate it when you say that!" The dishwater blonde responded with a groan. Jessica gave her a flat look, and couldn't help but to roll her eyes.

"Welp, looks like peacetime is over." Bre pulled up beside her on her quad, killing it.

"Because I love getting that feeling. It's just a feeling, it probably isn't anything." Jessica said.

"You say that every time and it is always something!" Her cousin huffed.

"Again, possibility it is just a false alarm" She tried to reason.

"Great, vacation time has put you in denial" Her sister Bre huffed too.

"Whatever, take it how you want, I am going to head back" Jessica started up her quad and it gave off a loud roar. She loved this thing so much.

"Oh come on! We have barely seen you!" Maranda pouted. Jessica laughed as she turned around. Her cousins can have plenty of fun without her, she was actually a little unnerved and crabby at her current feeling of something happening.

"Sorry, but I have someone waiting for me back at base." She told them. True she hasn't been gone for very long, but she couldn't help herself. She got on her comm link, looking around to make sure there weren't any people around. Idaho dunes were a very popular place after all.

"Jazz, may I have a ground bridge back to base?" A green portal opened up in front of her and she drove through on her quad, heading for her house. Hopping off the still running quad and going through the man door on the side of the garage she walked by her custom Jeep. Then opened the large door, hopped on the quad and parked it. She raced the garage door as it went down and made her journey to the medbay, her mood already lighting up as she got closer.

She walked into the large medical area made for bots to see Ratchet who quickly turned around. Well, come on, if the twins targeted you as much as they did him, you'd be paranoid too. She merely nodded at him, but he wasn't the one she was here to see. She immediately made her way to a crib and plucked a little black mech that had red flaming decal and blue optics. She couldn't help but to smile with adoration at her youngling.

"Hey Ratchet, how did all of his check-ups turn out?" She picked the little mechling up, kissing him on his cheek.

"He is a healthy little mech." Was the answer and the woman sighed with relief. The sparkling hugged her tightly. A smile found it's way onto her face and she hugged him back, gently rocking him while he sat on her hip.

"I missed you too my little Armonius Prime." She laughed

"You've only been gone for an hour." Ratchet reasoned.

"So? Still missed him" She kissed his helm as well for emphasis. She loved her baby, he was just the cutest thing in her eye and she felt so blessed to be able to have him. Ratchet just merely smiled at the two as the little mech clicked and smiled at his mother, he was indeed a healthy strong mechling. And would grow quickly into a mech a lot like his father.

"If Nemesis had any doubt that little one was his, it could be put to rest by how much Armonius looks like him, minus the blue optics." Jess looked up at him with a raised brow.

"Trying to say something there Ratchet?" She challenged.

"Not at all." His not so innocent smirk said otherwise.

"Daaamn, that glossa has become more and more lethal, jerk." Jessica pivoted on her heels, her baby in a secure hold, and she started to make her way out of the medbay, laughing.

"See you soon for more check ups!" She promised. The last thing she heard was Ratchet's laughter at the dig he got in on her. She gave him props for it, it was original, and it wasn't his usual threat or dad humor. He's learning, was that a good thing? Who freaking knows… Probably not.

Once home, Jessica and Armonius sat on the couch, just relaxing and watching some T.V. She was feeding him some special sparkling energon. She really did just enjoy simple calming moments like this because they meant a lot to her. For the first time in a long time she felt safe and enabled to let her guard down, enjoy life and focus on important things. Or important to her specifically. Her 5'4 frame cradled the little mech while he ate. She herself was watching cartoons. Had it turned on for him yes, but she did just like to watch them. It was childish, but she didn't give a fuck to be completely honest.

Then she heard the white noise of a diesel engine closing in. If possible, her smile grew even wider for several reasons. For starters, she absolutely loved the sound of that Cummins diesel engine. Like, it sent shivers down her spine with a smile, even after all her years of being with him.

Second of all, it had a very distinct rumble to her, one only her mate had. So she knew he was home from working with his brother, Optimus, in all the human politics at their N.E.S.T base. To put it simply, he was home, and that made her happy. She loved his company, even when he was a smart ass. Especially when he was a smart ass. Not many could keep up with her own venom tongue.

"Hello." Nemesis greeted them as his holoform walked away from his alt mode. Jessica smiled at him, craning her body around to see him. He answered with a smile back at her and walked over to the couch. Armonius by now had finished his energon and she placed it on a tray table. Then held back a yelp of surprise when Neme's holoform picked her up very carefully to not wake him, and he set both on his lap. He hugged Jessica and kissed her temple then looked down at his son when he powered on his little optics.

"Nothing gets by you, does it sparkling?" He smiled proudly at his son. He leaned down and kissed his helm. Armonius smiled and reached towards his father, blue optics sparkling. Nemesis brought his hand near him to let him hold one of his fingers, the smile never leaving his face towards his son.

Armonius's optics slowly descended into powering off, but he quickly opened them up again. It was amusing to Jessica. He was trying so hard to stay online but he was losing that fight, he was still young and needed lots of sleep after all.

"Come on Nessie, let's get you to your room so you can recharge." Nemesis leaned forward so she would have an easier time to get back up on her feet. She got up, keeping Armonius cradled protectively against her chest and smiled when her son lost the fight on recharge and succumbed to it. He was already innocent, but the was something about his sleeping form, he was not only innocent now but peaceful and happy as well.

She hoped she could always keep him feeling this safe but she knew with time it would be anything close to impossible. So she will fight like a mother fucker to prolong that feeling for him. She will do anything for him, and her sparkmate.

She got to the top of the stairs and went down the large hall. It had to be big enough for Nemesis to move around in here too. Speaking of which, she heard him follow her up but he headed towards their room.

She walked into Armonius's room and put him onto his bed. Transformers generally slept on a berth, but she just didn't like that idea. So she got him a bed with plenty of pillows and blankets which he loved to curl up into and of course, it was adorable.

Jessica leaned down and kissed his helm for probably the millionth time that day. So sue her, she just loved him so much and couldn't help it.

"Recharge well my boy." She lingered by the door, watching him for one more moment with a smile before closing it behind her. She began walking after her sparkmate. He was probably about to lay down and watch some TV, so she would just sit with him and he can tell her about his day. This was usually accompanied by funny commentary and banter at the show they were watching, especially cheesy old horror films.

She walked in and looked around her room with a raised brow. What the hell? She swore to god she just saw him walk in here, but he was nowhere in sight? She didn't have to wonder too much longer, because his holoform swooped her up again. She gave a small laugh, and he kissed her as he set her on the bed. He gently pushed her down and got over the top of her while giving her deep kisses that make her shiver in pleasure.

He rubbed her sides as he shifted himself closer over her. His hips moved against her agonizingly slowly, getting a gasp out of her right before her phone started to ring on the nightstand. Fuck you phone! Jess had her hands around his neck, and she had a very, very hard time concentrating when he started to kiss her neck and continued to trail kisses to her chest.

She read the caller ID and looked at it with heavy amounts of irritation. It was Lennox and she had to answer it. She gently and with much regret put some distance between Nemesis and her. Anymore longer of the treatment he was giving her and she would sound like a braindead monkey trying to talk to her boss.

"Damn it..." Lennox! You freaking mood killer! Nemesis, oh man, the look he gave her phone made her fear for its safety, it was pretty freaking funny actually.

"I am going to throw that thing out the window and shoot it." He grumbled. It was almost like a pout and Jessica couldn't help but to laugh, composing herself before answering the cell phone.

"Hello? Woah, Lennox. Calm down dude. What? Ok? Uh. Ok. I'll be down there in a minute. Ok, see you soon." She hung up, raising a brow in confusion at that quick conversation, what even was that?

"What did he want?" Nemesis let her up.

"I don't know, wouldn't tell me." She slid out from underneath him and started to change into some cargo pants. Her belt with her holster secured on the right side of her hip came on next. Then she quickly stuffed her upper pockets full of magazines for her 9mm glock and the lower Velcro pockets held clips for her AK47.

She put a small camel back on. It seems small, sleek and all but it had subspace technology so she could carry a large variety of things in it. Then slapped a mag into her glock, chambered a round and did press check, ensuring a round was in the chamber. Then swung her AK around, strap going across her chest, barrel pointed down. She did the process of gearing up so many times it took mere short minutes.

Nemesis sat up, and walked up to her, snaking his hands around her waist and she looked up at him curiously.

"Please. Be careful femme." Nemesis urged. She smiled up at her worry mech. He did have reason to worry, sure, but she still didn't like him too. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him down to her height, giving him a kiss which he gladly returned.

She ran her hands down his chest and torso. She knew he was worked up and just wanted to mess with him. Sure enough he tensed up under her touch and even let out a low moan, making her smile in the kiss. She stopped her hands at his stomach though. She wasn't _that_ mean to him. She pulled away, and hugged him instead.

"I'll be back." She told him.

Nemesis jokingly glared at her. "You'll pay for that one." He huffed, he really was worked up.

"I'll be looking forward to it." She smiled and winked at him. He shook his head with a chuckle and watched her head out. That's another thing, they were both total perverts to each other, it was both hilarious and sexy. Win, win.

The farther she got from her house, the more her good mood vanished. She had a feeling she knew what Lennox was going to have her do. And if it was, it was going to throw a very damp rag over her day, because things are about to get complicated. She let off a sigh, walking to the communications room and nodded at Jazz and her sister in law, Lindsey.

Jazz was smirking, he knew something and she was not liking it. This was not good, no one knew Lennox better than Jazz with the exception of a few others. And that fucker had a sick sense of humor, and she knew it. She all but groaned, yup, she is stepping into a mess meeting Lennox today.

"Jazz? Can you send me to Lennox please?"

"Sure thing little lady!" Yup, he was too excited. The green portal opened and she walked through wanting to scream, or punch something, or both. Yeah, both sounded good.

"Peacetime over..." She muttered to unlistening ears as she stepped on.


	4. Chapter 4

Jessica walked across the tarmac, nodding at familiar faces, not really knowing most of them by name or on a personal level. Well, besides the ones limited to her adopted family, all the bots and her cousins and sister. But other than that, maybe one or two other people really knew her, because that's all she trusted. And for good freaking reason.

"Jessica." Lennox was coming in on her fast, that panicked vibe still radiating off of him. She raised a brow and stared at him. What was wrong with him?

"Lennox, what is going on? Why are you calling all panicked like?" Jessica was getting more and more irritated by the minute.

"Look, it's not my place to say. Just follow me." Lennox ordered. It was getting to the point where Jessica was starting to believe he was purposely trying to irritate her now.

"You control the operations known as N.E.S.T. Why wouldn't you be able to tell me, one of your soldiers, whom you are sending on said mission? What's going on? Am I going in on this mission blind?" She raised a brow challengingly. Lennox gave her a flat look as they walked on, for some reason they were heading towards the rec room.

"First off, wouldn't be the first time you have gone into something blind, you and your squad are called suicide squad after all." And no, not like DC, though that movie looks pretty sweet honestly. It's just they tended to go on the missions that most N.E.S.T soldiers would generally shy away from, but hey, it paid well.

"Second of all, have you been watching the news or any TV for the past 5-10 minutes? Specifically the news?" Lennox asked, turning to her.

"If I wanted to watch a bunch of half truths and bull shit I would turn on super jail." Jessica huffed, that show, was on pcp, straight up. "What the hell is the problem? Oh for the love of god Lennox, just tell me!"

"Just keep following me." Lennox urged instead.

Jessica stopped in her tracks, that's it, she is going straight for her theory. "It's about the turtle recruits isn't it?" Jessica gave him an accusing glare.

"Kind of, come on, they really need to hurry out of here." Jessica didn't like that answer, she didn't want to get involved at all in that mess. She is about to spell that out to him!

The two N.E.S.T personnel walked in, sure enough, two ninja turtles. They weren't the full grown ones, these ones looked like teens, around her age maybe. Jess sighed, why the hell did they need her? They didn't look too thrilled to see her either, so they probably don't know anything about her. The angry gray masked teen looked very, very pissed. If Jess wasn't so irritated herself, she would have laughed at the irony here.

"Will! I don't have time for this! I need to go home!" Man, what was it with everyone freaking out today? The poor female turtle looked like she was about to cry, yeah, Jessica was oh so totally lost right now.

"Calm down a minute Ty." Will seemed a little more calm now, probably because him and the turtles being panicky and Jess being crabby was a bad mix. Way to take a step up Lennox.

"Calm?! _That's my father out there!_ " His hand was wildly waving at the T.V. screen. By the looks of it it had been doing that a lot. Jessica tried not to roll her eyes. These guys were supposed to be this awesome fighting team? Shit...they couldn't even keep their composure.

All of a sudden another one come barging into the room, nearly running her over if she wasn't quick enough to get out of the way. Sure the turtle was easily seven foot, easily, but for the love of god... These guys were supposed to be ninjas too? Respect the little people!

"Ty!" He hollered.

"I know!" The gray masked one replied. Ty as he was called apparently.

Finally Jessica wandered over and took a look at the T.V. The news was on, and as much as she hated the media, she watched. And what she saw was dragons steal things out of warehouses and even trains.

"So, these turtles come in limited dragon addition, huh?" She flatly asked Lennox.

"They've been that way. You really haven't been reading the reports, have you?" Lennox countered, he knew she was calm enough to snip at her.

"Sorry, was attending my own shit storm" She retorted right back.

"Touché, real quick, Jessica? This is Ty, Lavi, and Thane. Guys? This is Jessica, she can help you." Lennox promised. Jessica composed herself a little bit, she was going to need loads of patience with this currently panicky turtle family.

"Alright, I'm following you guys." Jess offered. The biggest one looked her up and down, the fact he was unimpressed clear on his face. And here we freaking go...

"And who the fuck are you exactly?" Pretty sure Will just introduced them shell for brains.

His brother or whoever he was to him was looking at her the same way, eyes narrowed. "How in the hell can she help? She take lessons in dragon wrangling? I've had enough, I'm going home. Now."

That's it, little disrespectful- "You turtles have been hanging around humans too long, not even the good ones either. Automatically assuming based on appearance, but hey, keep at it, I'm sure it'll get you far." She said her statement with a cool expression. She wasn't used to such disrespect, _especially_ from recruits. They were just being little asses. She was so freaking tempted to just walk away. She looked at her boss with irritated expression herself, he looked at her with a firm look, silently ordering her to get over it.

Much the Jessica's surprise, the girl seemed to be calm enough to really put some thought together looking at the young woman intently. She placed a hand on her relative's, Jess was assuming, arm and stared a hole into the front liner.

"You know us, but we know nothing of you. Yet will here, someone my father trusts very much, seems to think you can help. I ask straight up… Can you?" Jessica forced her anger away again, they weren't used to stuff like this, she had to remember that.

"Yes. I can, my name is Jessica Usagi. The plan is to get more details on what happened, then I will wrangle up my girls, organize a mission and we can take off. Won't take more than a day." She promised.

Ty wasn't taking her retort in the best way, he was shaking but refused to slap the female turtle's hand off of him. His relative watched her again for a long while, Jess just stayed still and waited, watching back calmly.

"Take her to see mom. She's the only one who knows what's going on." Huh, well lookie there. Finally a break through with these guys.

"Are you nuts?! We don't even know her, and you want me to take her to the lair?" Ok, maybe not. Deep breaths Jessica, felt like she was taking 2 steps forward, then ten more back with this stubborn group.

"That's going to go over really well with our fathers." The biggest one, Thane? Think it was Thane, responded.

Lavi looked as frustrated as Jessica felt, ok, probably more, but the young turtle girl pointed at the screen. It showed a dragon that had orange trim running around, seemingly set on a task. "As if they have a say in the damn matter! And we aren't even sure where our mothers are! No one has been answering the damn lair phone! Something could have happened to them too!"

Thane winced at that, but stayed silent. Huh, so Lavi had a temper, and Jessica was about to meet her mother, this was going to be good. So much sarcasm there. Maybe she got the temper from her father? Jessica doesn't know why, but she seriously doubted that.

Ty finally took a deep breath, probably coming to his senses and making himself calm down too.

"Come with me. We need to ground bridge to New York." Jessica trailed him, giving a quick nod at Lennox before he left her line of sight, and the turtles led them to the control room where the ground bridge on this base was stationed.

"Kyle? I need a small bridge home." Ty asked.

"The planned rooftop?" He asked in return. Ty just nodded and Kyle opened one so Ty, Thane and Jessica could step through, they were on one of the many rooftops of the city.

She followed the teens down a ladder, keeping a low profile and not doing anything fancy. Did she feel kind of bad for hiding secrets? Yes. But she wasn't going to be hanging out with this group for very long. They were just from two different worlds that wouldn't fit in harmony. Hence, she didn't have a reason to reveal anything about herself for the time being.

She watched the twitchy teen. Man...he was starting to make her stress out for him. He needed to calm down, this attitude was no good if they wanted to accomplish anything. She stopped him, but kept her tone calm, she needed to have a little sensitivity to them in this kind of situation. "You need to cool it, if you are so uncomfortable bringing me down to your liar, bring your mother up here and we will figure something out. I was sent here to help you, not to send you into a more stressed out and pissy mood." Jessica urged.

"You don't understand. That is more than just my father out there. He's merged with a spirit that gives him that dragon form, against the wishes of some very powerful individuals. The spirits were able to outwit them so that he could stay on this world with my uncles." He began to explain, continuing their decent towards the ground. "But if they see what is happening now they will come back and try to banish our fathers to the spirit realm. In light of that...you coming into our home is actually nothing compared to that problem. And this isn't the place to discuss it. Mother would never come out here to have a very lengthy conversation with my cousin and I out in the open like this."

Jessica all but rolled her eyes, but not at the young turtle, at the situation. For many, many reason. He just confirmed her theory on what was going on. Indirectly, but he did nonetheless

Thane gave a grunt in agreement as the turtles led the young woman on down the fire escape. She kept up and humored them on being faster.

"Father trusts Will, and he trusts you. And I'm going to trust in them. I assume you are allied with the bots in some way. A few of them already know where we live so it's no big reveal. This way." Ty lead the way, waiting for Jessica at the bottom.

"Yes, I am a N.E.S.T soldier. My cousins, sister and I tend to work with the bots a lot." Jessica was just about done with this whole situation already. But she had to confirm what was running through her head get a little closure before running headfirst into this bull shit. Some other thoughts swam around in her head but she pushed those to the side for now.

"So, your fathers pissed off some gods huh?" She asked calmly. Yeah, that didn't sit so well with Ty, he looked up at her with a hint of anger. She probably could have asked that in a better way, but fuck it, too late now. It was out there with that tone.

"No, they didn't." She could tell he was trying to keep his temper in check. "The gods offered them something to save this planet and everything on it, and in return they wanted our fathers to leave this world after doing that. They were willing to give everything they loved up just so we could all have a chance to live on." Jessica nodded it at that. And also gave an internal scream, she didn't want to deal with gods.

"Shitty ass reward, but they were going to follow through with it anyway." Thane responded from down below her where they both waited for her to finish descending the fire escape.

"The spirits didn't think that was fair and intervened. Our fathers had nothing to do with the god shitfit that happened after that. All they did was what they always do: Fight for those who can't fight on their own." Ty dropped into the sewer after opening the manhole cover. Thane looked at her with an eyeridge raised, she silently raised one as well, a nonverbal: "is there a problem?"

"And who told you they were gods anyway? Back at base you didn't have a fucking clue what happened." Jessica was getting real irritated with his underestimating her. But calmed herself, he wasn't the first, and he wont be the last person. He'll see eventually.

Besides, she was a 5'4 little girl around their age. She would probably assume too under the conditions they were under when they themselves haven't had the experiences she has. She knew better than to underestimate someone. And that was because of several bad experiences, most in which she wasn't even underestimating her opponent! She was kind of glad they were in that oblivion, because that means they are staying strong and haven't had a situation bad enough to make them paranoid like her.

"Had a hunch. Was praying to god I was wrong." She looked up at the sky, almost looking angry, before she hopped in to go down the ladder. Thane closed the cover after everyone started to make their descent down the ladder, it should probably smell horrible down here, but Jessica has smelled much worse. The shit storm she was getting into though, oh her sister and cousins were going to be pretty pissed when she got back with this intel.

.

.

We wandered into our home, and found it once again empty. Over two days now... And still nothing... I was honestly wondering how much more of this I could take. The worry was eating me alive, slowly tearing me apart from the inside out. Where were they... I didn't know, and I also didn't know anymore where to look. I sat on the couch and tiredly rubbed my eyes, and the tears that formed in them away.

Caitlin and Marina had wandered back into the lab, their usual pattern by now, as Cris meandered on towards the kitchen. I knew she was going to make us something to eat, and I also knew none of us would really feel like eating it.

The silence in our home was what hurt the most. Everything here reminded us of them, but they themselves could not be found. They had built this home, and now I was wondering if they would ever come back to it. I couldn't take it anymore. I had to turn the TV on to drown out the silence. And when I did I regretted it instantly. I rose slowly back to my feet as I saw Raph's dragon form attach to a train car, and smoothly lifted it up before he flew off with it, that of course caused the train to derail. And the headline on the screen of "Dragon menace" really wasn't helping. "No!" I screamed at the box that just prattled on. "God please, _no!_ "

Of course my outburst drew the others back into the living area, and they stared in shock and disbelief, as I was, at what we were watching. I wasn't the only one crying now as we watched our husbands do the one thing they never would do. Cause harm.

"Mom?" The quiet question came from a familiar voice from behind me. I saw my son, and the son of the blue banded dragon that was now flashing across the screen, walking quickly towards me. I tried not to cry when I saw him...and I failed. His arms wrapped around me to try and comfort me as I began to sob against his chest. I automatically knew why he was here.

Thane came in next, quickly moving towards Cris.

"Mom...what happaned?" Ty asked, trying to get me to calm down enough to talk to him.

"I don't know!" I wailed even harder.

I cried a few moments, with Ty still trying to calm me down before someone else made their presence known. "Ma'am?" I looked up from Ty's chest to see a young woman with brown hair and bluish green eyes walk towards me, one I didn't know. "My name is Jessica. I was sent by William Lennox to help you. Is there any leads at all? Anything found at the scene? Anything will help." She then waited patiently for me to get my act together.

I sniffled as I looked unsure up at Ty. "It's ok Mom." He quietly reassured me.

"How much does she know?" I finally calmed down enough to ask as I wiped my eyes.

My son just shrugged. "More I think than she lets on. She acts all normal...but she's either psychic or she can see in the dark better than most humans. She just went through the motions of me guiding her through the tunnels."

Jessica stuck her thumb in her pockets and looked away from Ty. Almost like she just got a taste of something she wasn't expecting. I'm guessing my son hit on something she wasn't expecting him to figure out.

"Will sent her?" I asked him quietly and he answered with a nod.

I gave her a long, probing stare as I sized her up. She wasn't very tall, even Ari was taller, but she held herself with that air of confidence of someone who had been through some shit. A lot of it. Hard to believe from someone who looked as young as she did. Heck, she looked like she was Ty's age of early twenties. "There has to be a reason why Will chose you... He wouldn't just send anyone..." I told Jessica in a quiet voice before I let out a very shaky sigh. I was still on the verge of losing my composure. "Because not just anyone can handle them now... I'm not sure what to tell you. All I know is we went out for a run two nights ago and we stopped for a little bit. Caitlin wanted to look at something. They waited on the roof of the building nearby for us to finish. Then a few minutes later they were just...gone... The bond closed and Marina and Cait lost all feeling for them. The only thing we found were their weapons along with Donnie's pack and other gadgets." I pointed to the very large pile of very sharp shit placed neatly in the corner. "Then I see...that..." My hand waved wildly at the tv screen.

The look she gave was a critical one, almost like she didn't want to be here and couldn't believe after two days that's all that we had to go on. And she obviously wasn't happy about it. "You didn't find anything else? They were just kidnapped? From what I have heard. No one has ever been able to sneak up on them let alone catch them so easily. If you can't provide any more information," She shrugged "it all good. My girls and I can go off of what you already told me. We've worked with less. But any bit of information helps."

Thane had went over to the weapons by that point, and he shot her a nasty glare. For some reason I had the feeling they didn't get off to a good start themselves. I know she was starting to rub me the wrong way. "Hey...go easy on them! It's not the first time one of us has been swiped, but it is the first time they just upped and disappeared without a-...hey...what's this?" His gaze went curiously towards his hand and what ever he was holding in it.

"What's what?" Ty was now walking over to join him.

"This?" He holds up a very small fragment of what looked like a crystal. "It was stuck in Uncle Mikey's 'chuck chain."

Jessica walked over to him and checked it out. I knew I wasn't supposed to hear the "fuck" that slipped out quietly, but I did. So did the rest of us. "Don't tell anyone about that. It will hinder progress dramatically. I'm going to head back and discuss things with Lennox. Then we will head out to find them."

She began to make her way to the door, only to find that way blocked by a very angry Cris who glared at her through narrowed eyes. "What is it." She wasn't really asking. "Don't be playing these mysterious games with us or I'll beat the answers out of you!"

Marina also walked over to them, her eyes very cool. Which meant she was mad too. "And we are going with you."

The boys exchanged a quick, rueful glance at that.

"You should have known that was coming." Thane told Ty.

"I did. Just not so sure she expected it though."

Jessica was eyeing Cris, then took in a deep breath before she slowly released it. I was getting the vibe that we were slightly annoying her. Well...tough shit. "That substance is something that could force us to abort the whole mission. And without my squad and I to help you guys out. Your options are slim to zero chance of being able to get them back. And as for the rest of you. I advise you to stay home or settle down at a base for several reasons. You could be sucked into a shit storm you have yet to face with the direction this bull shit is going." The look she gave us told us that she really hoped we would do just that.

I blew that notion right out of the water. "The hell we will!" My foot impacted into the poor coffee table, which was then sent flying across the room to crash into the wall where it broke apart and fell to the floor.

"There goes the furniture..." Ty mumbled under his breath.

"Fine!" I spun back at Jessica, my eyes blazing. "You don't want us to go with you? We'll go out our damn selves and look for them! I'm not just going to sit here and have some stranger tell me I should just sit on my ass and do nothing!" I kicked the end table next and it followed the same path as the coffee table, and had the same results.

Cris raised an accusing brow at Jessica. "Now look what you did."

"Lady..." Marina began in her quiet, cool, Imma 'bout to kick your ass voice. "You don't know half the shitstorms we've seen. We never backed down from any of them, we refuse to do so now."

"You might as well just give that reasoning up." Thane quietly told Jessica, eyeballing all of us. "They mean it. If they don't go with you they will tear the whole country apart looking for them on their own."

She bit her lip, hard, before taking a few more breaths to calm own. "Because leading five stubborn ass girls wasn't bad enough." She grumbled before sending me a very cool glare. "Fine. Just realize. If they hurt you, they will never be the same." Then she turned it towards Marina, who matched it. "And things can always get worse. Just when you think you've seen it all. Feel like life can't get any harder or scarier. You jinx yourself, and pay for it in the end. But hell, if you want to help your mates. Who am I to stop you. I can only warn you." Again she turned towards the exit.

And again she was stopped. This time by the couch pillow Caitlin, of all people, threw at her. "That doesn't mean we just give up on them and let strangers just waltz all over them! Will sent you to help, did he not?" Her blazing green eyes narrowed. "Help means just that, you help us, _not_ tell us what we should or shouldn't do!"

Thane was looking at Caitlin in shock. "Yup...she's worried. Not often she flips her lid like that when there's no patient involved.

Whatever was about to be said next was cut off by Ty's shrill whistle. "All of you knock it off! How is this bickering going to help anything!" This time he was the one taking a deep breath to calm down. We all seemed to be doing a lot of that... "Look, Jessica, I understand your concern. But you don't understand how this family works. We would never leave one of our own in trouble. Our moms could no more sit this out than our fathers would if the roles were reversed. Especially my mom. She's got a connection with Father that goes deeper than you understand right now. Who knows, it may be that connection that may be able to help...if we can find them. If we do this, we do this together. It's how we've always done it."

"Which is why I'm letting them come with my team. This is going to be a long mission." Jessica grumbled. Cris made a sneering nose wrinkle at her and mimicked her as Jessica got onto her comm. I was assuming it was her comm anyway. I really hoped she didn't have a habit of talking to imaginary folks. "Bre? Tell everyone to gear up and get ready, when I get back. I am going over what I learned with Lennox then we'll be heading out. And uh, we have some new team members. Yes... I know. Dude! I _know_! I told them. Yup. Well..." She looked over at the destroyed furniture. "They aren't exactly civilians... Yes. Alright, see you when I get back. Have everything ready please. Thanks." She lowered her hand and sighed. "Vacation time is over." Her gaze went to Ty. "Meet you back on base." This time when she left, she was allowed to go unmolested.

I was still glaring at the door she disappeared through as Ty walked over to me. "Come on Mom. Grab what you need. You'll all come back to the base with us and we'll figure this out...ok? Just calm down and let's try and piece this together."

My eyes began to water all over again at his calm tone. "Do you have any idea how much you sound like him right now..."

He gave me a small smile in return. "It's only natural...he is my father after all. Some of him is bound to rub off on me."

"I'm not sure I like her." Cris grumbled. "Vacation time pfft... The guys can't even enjoy their damn retirement."

"Just get your crap and let's go." I sighed at her.

Cris grumbled some more under her breath as she did that. Ty calmly walked over and started to gather the guy's things.

"What are you doing?" Thane asked him.

"I have a feeling they are going to want these when they are finally found. And want to put them to use."

"You look like a walking armory."

"Well then here," Ty pushed some of the equipment into Thane's arms "you carry some then we can both look stupid."

Thane gave him a flat look, then he followed his mother's lead and grumbled to himself as he was loaded up like a pack mule. It didn't take us long after that to make our own way to the surface. And Ty held my hand the entire way. I held onto that hand for dear life. He was all I had of Leo at the moment to take comfort in.


	5. Chapter 5

Jessica returned back to her base and was still mumbling absurdities under her breath. Man, those people and turtles though, she was trying to remember their situation and have some empathy for them. But holy mother of hell, they were stubborn, hard headed, asinine and she was having a hard time keeping her cool.

Maranda came up to Jess, "Peace time over?"

"Peace time over" Jessica nodded.

Maranda, surprisingly enough, looked bummed out because of that, liking the down time as much as the rest of her family.

"Well, on the bright side. We got any peace time. Because let's face it, relaxation and peace doesn't usually last as long as it did." Jessica pointed out. It kind of sucked, how true that statement was. But compared to their past, a year and a half of no fighting? That was insanely good.

"Based on our track, record Striker is right." Bre pursed her lips in agreement.

"So what are we up against." Carrie asked, going straight to the point. She wasn't one to beat around the bush.

"Turtle dragons. That's not even the hard part. Hard part will be us containing them without hurting them. They are being brainwashed. But we don't know by who."

"Can't we just drain them? If they are what we've been feeling, they are Elemental." Megan countered, crossing her arms. Something was putting her on edge. Jessica somehow knew that even Megan didn't know what it was yet. She had some sympathy for her cousin, she always kept things in unless you pried them from her. And it wasn't like a: "oh what is wrong and she spills" It was a: "almost on the verge of needing to beat it out of her." So frustrating sometimes!

"We don't know their cores or entities well enough. We could kill them if we aren't careful. So. Let's not risk that"

"And how are our new team mates?" Bre asked. Oh, she freaking knew the frustration spike in her sister. This turd was just rubbing it in now, and Jess wasn't appreciating it.

"Charming." Jessica huffed.

"Come on Striker, don't go all hard hearted on them. Their mates are running around causing havoc unwillingly. They're just scared and angry." Bailey pointed out. She looked far more empathetic, she would be the most out of all of them. Bailey tended to be more understanding, she was vital that way. Better with handling distressed civilians, or super soldier ladies and ninja turtles that were about to tear the countryside apart single handedly.

"You're right. They don't know how to shut their emotions down like we do. I should be a little more sensitive. I'd murder a bitch if someone brainwashed Nemesis." Jessica said, dark look in her eyes.

"We'll make it up to them." Bailey assured. And when she promised something like that, she stuck to it, she had a good heart.

"Didn't the hot headed youngling find Chaos crystal?" Bre queried, crossing her arms and eyeing her sister.

"Yeah... About that. Not. A. Fucking. Word. Or we'll never get this mission, and with the stubborn streak I have been getting out of this group, they will take everything on their own. Stubborn women." She eyed her team. Bre merely snorted at her sister, hoping she was just kidding around with the tone of that statement.

"Something amusing you sis?" Jess questioned

"So pretty much what you are saying is that they are anything close to us personality wise?"

Jessica caught on. "Yeah. Unfortunately."

"Just depends on the situation dear sister. Come on, let's go meet up with them."

.

.

When the distraught turtle wives finally gathered in the rec room, the rest of the children had already gathered. And worried expressions were to be found on all of their faces.

"Mom!" Ari was trying not to cry as she ran to Caitlin and threw her arms around her mother. "What's going on? Why is Daddy out there...doing that..."

Caitlin held her blonde, pink masked turtle daughter close, her own eyes once again filling with moisture. "I don't know pumpkin...I don't..."

Lavi was also holding tight to her mother by now, also trying not to cry. Lavi's lavender eye band was moist with tears of worry she had already shed. Vicky just wrapped her arms around the girl, not knowing what to say to comfort her. "Mom.. What do we do..." Vicky shook her head as she pulled her daughter tighter against her. Her brown eyes closed tightly to hold back the tears.

Dante was sitting at a nearby table, furiously working hard on the laptop placed in front of him. If he was trying to solve this puzzle, or just trying to keep his mind occupied, none of them could really tell. His yellow masked eyes never left the screen his focus was on it so hard. He didn't even look up to greet his mother as Marina walked over to him.

Grey masked Ty and black masked Thane struggled to keep their own composure they had managed to find at the sight of the distraught females. But both of them had their fists tightly clenched at their sides. Someone was going to pay for this, just as soon as they could figure out where to send the bill.

Jessica walked into the rec room calmly talking to Lennox and a tall black haired gentleman. Vicky looked over the group as they came in, trying to read something from all these strangers. She had to admit, she was having a very hard time with this. Will trusted this bunch apparently enough to have them help, but yet Vicky knew nothing of them. It left a very bitter taste in her mouth that Leo's well being was depending on a bunch of strangers.

Her eyes watched as they all filed in and her eyes stopped at the tall man Will and Jessica were still talking to. He had piercing red eyes, obviously a holoform, but was he a Decepticon? Obviously defected if that was the case. Jessica was fully geared up with an AK strapped to her back still and there was a gaggle of girls following her in a professional manner. A very young looking, like, middle school looking, blonde had Sniper secured to her back, she was even shorter than Jessica. And not by an inch or two, she came up by about 4'9, but there was something of an ambiance about her.

Another had brown hair and brown eyes, she seemed more calm, and collected, and all in all, nicer to be around.

While the second in command looking girl had brown hair and green eyes, looked like Jessica but much taller, like, a whole hell of a lot taller.

One had a chilling presence, like she has seen and lived through the worst of the worse, she had an eerie air to her, she was pretty with a short blonde pixie cut and piercing blue eyes.

Last one had hazel eyes, and hair that stopped with at her shoulders, she was a dishwater blonde, looked like she was pretty much on the same boat as the blonde, but hid it behind a mischievous attitude.

And all of them a puzzle as far as Vicky was concerned. She still didn't fully understand why Will thought bringing this bunch in would do any good.

"So that's all I got, the family wants to come along." Jessica finished briefing her boss.

"That's fine. Let them go. Anything else?"

"No sir, that's it." Jessica replied smoothly, on the inside? She did not like lying at all, and usually sucked at it unless it was with an enemy.

"We clear to head out yet?" the eager yet annoyed looking blonde asked.

"As long as you have given us all your Intel, I don't see a problem with you heading out. Just be careful, all of you" Nemesis eyed Jessica the hardest with a firm expression, even his holoform could look intimidating. But to be honest his intimidating expressions weren't scary to her, she thought they were pretty sexy if anything, everyone else? That was a different story, she knew that by the twitchiness of her cousins and sister. Jessica smiled at her husband, he was going to be able to see right past it, but by god she would try.

"We will." Jessica walked up to the turtle wives and teens before any mannerisms gave her away.

"See...Will knows us better than to try and pull that stunt…" Now that the N.E.S.T soldiers were close enough, the female hot headed lady, Cris? Yeah. She decided to open her mouth.

Marina slapped her shoulder

"Just stop it already. We've already had that argument."

"Well, we don't know you. Pretty good excuse to us" Maranda retorted. She watched Cris, she was sizing her up, but not like a normal person would, to her, sizing people up was an art form, and she knew how to do it. She knew several techniques and ways to figure out how a person ticks, and Jessica was strongly disapproving of the fact she was doing it on the woman.

"Maranda, we so don't need this right now, save it for the enemy." On both parts! Maranda grumbled, eyeing the new part of her team with irritation.

"See how this mission is going to go." she huffed. Then glared at Bre after the young second in command slapped her cousin upside the head, giving her a warning glare.

"Ow."

"Are we ready to head out?" She needed to get her team out of here before her hot head went trigger happy.

"No, we're not ready." Jessica doesn't believe she had met this young turtle that spoke.

"What are you doing now?" Thane asked, looking over the shoulder of his cousin

"Making it easier to find them." He turned his laptop around to show his little presentation and theory. "They've been hitting chemical supply trains and warehouses...right?"

"From what the news tells us...yes." Thane agreed.

"All the trains hit have been in this area." He circled one of his three fingers around an area of a map he had up.

"And there is another shipment scheduled to go through soon. How much do you want to bet they are waiting in the surrounding countryside to pick that one off too?"

"Makes sense to me" Carrie was giving the computer screen a thoughtful look.

"Oi. Ladies and turtles? The team: Carrie, Bailey, Maranda, Megan, and my second in command, Bre

"They are known as the Suicide squad. They never work with anyone so try to be patient with them when it comes to their social skills" Will added, with that little smart ass remark. Jerk

"Oh screw you Will." Jessica grumbled

"This mission will either be very successful with you guys on a team or will go right in the crapper. So try to have a little sensitivity to the situation." Jessica looked about ready to rip him a new ass hole but paused, and bit her tongue. "Yes sir" she all but growled Lennox nodded.

"So Dante, where are they hitting next?" Will asked, looking at Donnie's son. Elementals listened while they loaded up their guns and did the necessary press checks, and quick examinations. On the other hand, Cris was STILL glaring at Maranda.

"How about I shove that AK down your throat?" to which, Marina smacked her on the arm with a firm expression on her face. "Will you quit!" She snapped.

Maranda just watched Cris with a cool expression, she was irritated at the women, but she knew when to strike.

Thane gave his mother a knowing look as he turned his head towards Cris. "Yeah...apparently we need to work on our social skills too."

Without missing a beat Cris took out her hanbo and popped him on the back of the legs with it. Her eyes never left Maranda's while she did it either. Oh boy...

"Ow! Damn it Mom!"

Vicky just rubbed her forehead as she listened to the impending argument. "Lord... Look. Can we all at least pretend to get along?" She plopped herself on the couch, clearly not wanting to deal with this right now. All she wanted to do was go out and find Leo and the others.

Ty just rolled his eyes over the bickering on both sides. "I'm Titian. My sister Lavinia. The practice dummy over there is Thane, the computer guy Dante and this is my little cousin Arianne. The temperamental lady over there using Thane for a practice dummy is my Aunt Cris, the one next to her Aunt Marina, And Aunt Caitlin here, and my mother Vicky." he finished with a sigh, his face taking on that worried expression again that had been plaguing them all night. "I'd introduce you to our fathers...but that's going to have to wait."

Megan watched them, her disposition could easily be misread as cold and heartless, she was aware of that. But she merely watched them curiosity, specifically the younger turtles, and turned to her cousin, murmuring lowly in a different language. "Is it just me? or do they look familiar somehow?"

Maranda looked back at her. Still looking irritated from her encounter with Cris, she responded just as quietly. "I think I'd remember them if we met them." She almost said the statement with a hiss, in the same language. Megan rolled her eyes, deciding that she would talk to her after she calmed down and was thinking properly.

Jessica smiled sympathetically yet amused at Thane, before she looked back at Ty. "You'll be able to introduce us soon enough. Promise. But we'll need to head out in order to get anywhere with this." She pointed out. But, of course, things can never go as smoothly as they should, or at the very minimum: how everyone wants them to go.

"What is that?" Nemesis's holoform pointed.

Jess followed his gaze to a small fraction of Chaos crystal that fell from some of the older ninja turtle gear and on to the ground

"A rock." She just stared at it, and not at him, because she knew the look he was giving her. Shit. All anger disappeared from her cousins, and sister, they all casually froze up.

"So you can pick it up and bring it outside?" Oh, he was so not buying it. He crossed his arms and gave Jess a critical look she stared back at him, picking up the "rock" and moved it to her palm so no one can see the flesh of her palm burn. Thankfully, none of the others were really watching, and were too glued to Dante's computer, or so she hoped, anyway, she walked over to the door to throw it out.

"Just a rock." She reasoned.

"Then let me see your palm that was just steaming a moment ago."

"Oh for Christ's sake Nemesis!"

It was then that Dante decided to get to his feet and walk in between the irritated couple, completely oblivious to their squabble as he looked at the laptop. Jess wasn't complaining, it was a freaking distraction after all.

"The way it looks Will, the area we need to bridge to is near here," he looked a little amused "a place called: Manhattan in Kansas."

Vicky slapped her palm to her forehead at that bit of information. "Now isn't that ironic from hell..."

"In more ways than one." Cris chuckled in agreement.

"I thought you might catch on Aunt Vic." Dante grinned at her. Now that they had a direction, and something resembling a plan forming, their mood was starting to brighten. They still worried for the missing turtles, a lot, but it wasn't that crippling fear anymore.

Jess ignored Neme's seething look and paid attention to the laptop.

"Well alright. Let's move." she announced.

Megan suddenly stiffened a little, as if listening to something. "And fast"

"Change in plans. You're not going. Not yet" Nemesis all but growled, giving Jessica a firm look.

"Neme, we have to go there now to get them, we'll be playing catch up trying to figure out where they are going to hit next." she insisted, more pleadingly than angrily.

"We'll find another way." he insisted, still fuming.

"There is not other way you hard headed mech!" Jessica crossed her arms at him, going into full sass mode.

"You'll remain here. Promise me." Jessica did a facepalm and ran her hand down her face, then put her hands behind her back and looked at him with heavy amounts of irritation, then looked at Will pleadingly, trying to get some backup against her stubborn ass husband.

"I'm not going against one of the boss bots." Will gave her a straight face, but it also silently asked if she was crazy too.

"Oh come the hell on!" Jess fumed as Nemesis' holoform flickered out.

"We don't have time for this!" Vicky also fumed at the argument. Their mood hadn't improved _that_ much. Any delay to her and the others was going to be met with fierce resistance, a point proven when she stomped out of the rec room and towards the ground bridge. Her family quickly moved to follow, until Ty stopped.

"Oh no sis." He firmly told Lavi. "You aren't coming."

"The hell I'm not!" She flared back at him, her face angry.

"That's right. You're not. You have no business out there."

Vicky looked at her daughter with curiosity at this exchange. She fully knew her daughter was just as capable as the rest of them, so why would Ty insist that she stay behind? She might be a valuable asset.

Lavi apparently wasn't going to give up without a fight either. "He's my father too!" Her blue/brown eyes were now flaring in anger.

But Ty wasn't so easily intimidated by that glare as he calmly looked back at her and crossed his arms. "And you are also carrying his grandchild. You are staying here."

The wide eyed looks her family gave her sealed her fate. There was no way now they were going to let her go with them. Not after hearing that. The defeated girl shook in her anger as she stared her brother down, and he still didn't budge on the matter. Then, purely out of the frustration she now felt mixed with her anger at having been so bluntly ratted out in this crucial moment, she slapped him. The echo of the sound lost in her emotional outburst that followed.

"You did that on purpose you asshole! I wasn't going to tell them yet!" Tears ran down her face before she abruptly turned and ran back into the rec room.

Her twin let out a long, slow sigh as he rubbed the cheek she just nailed. "I should have seen that coming."

"Yup." Thane agreed as he watched her go. "You shoulda."

Vicky just closed her eyes and shook her head. "Let's just go..." She sighed.

Jessica frowned as Lavi made her exit, then hit her comm before muttering into it real quickly. Bre smiled at her sis, she was getting a little more sensitive to the situation, a milestone, and she was proud of her.

"You softy" translation: I'm proud of you. Hey, they were still rough, tough military girls with a rep.

"Shut your mouth." Translation: thank you "And you!" She pointed at Lennox with a firm glare

"I know I'm not going to like this." Will knew what she was about to do, and although he was happy with her enthusiasm, this was not how he wanted to go about this.

"Blind eye Lennox" Jessica threatened.

"Either way, he's going to know you're gone and you're going to get massive brig time" Will promised.

Bre was on it, getting to work on her own comm. "Not if he's distracted with the terror twins and Blaster having a massive prank war against him." she innocently pointed out

"If I have to buff dings and scratches out of my poor mech, then all of the above will know true pain." Jessica promised in a dark and serious tone.

"It'll mostly be paint products." Bre shrugged.

"Alright, that should be ok, Let's go!" She lead Vicky and her group to the tarmac and kept moving, hitting her comm. "Jazz, bridge please! And hurry!" Clayshah sent the coordinates Dante so kindly provided. Ah, there was prowl, across the tarmac, and closing in. Shit... But thankfully, the ground bridge opened, and Striker quickly lead the way through. Maranda was dragging a very hesitant Megan along, threw her in, did a round off, in the middle of the round off, she through a smokescreen bomb at Prowl. Then went through the ground bridge whooping, and all the other girls of Jessica's grouped followed her. Prowl immediately had to stop, it wasn't an ordinary smoke bomb, it was one that blew some electrical out, but mainly the strange currents spazzed out his telemetry… Coincidence? Oh hell naw fam. But he kept up his velocity, speeding towards the remainder turtle family, remembering at least the area they were in.

Thane just looked at the speeding bot with amusement on his smug face "You haven't caught any of us yet and you're not going to today either!"

"Done this a time or two?" His mother asked him with a raised brow.

"...Maybe..."

Then with a burst off speed the turtle family joined their partners in crime through the ground bridge, and whatever waited on the other side.

And Lavi had no idea what would happen. Her Father was out there, causing all kinds of havoc, and now her family went out there to stop those rampaging dragons...and she was stuck here. She couldn't do a damn thing to help. All she could do was lay in this couch and cry.

Suddenly she felt a strong embrace around her and she clung to the unseen figure tightly. Those arms tightened themselves as they tried to give her comfort. "It'll be ok, Lavi." Elita's calm voice reached the distressed girl as she began to rock her. "Shh. It'll all be ok."


	6. Chapter 6

They came through so fast that their feet skidded a few feet over the loose ground when they tried to stop. Behind them the bridge had snapped shut, but Vicy didn't notice it as she took a deep breath to calm her nerves. Nerves that were feeling the strain of not having Leo by her side. "Which way Dante?"

"South." Came the confident reply from the teen as he lead the way. "We are actually pretty close to the train tracks. But we need to hurry, that train is scheduled to pass through soon."

She just nodded as she began to follow the youngster, and found herself walking next to Jessica. Recalling what had set off the mad dash for the ground bridge in the first place, she directed her words to the leader of this team. "You mind filling us in on what you are trying so hard to hide?" A mild surge of anger shot through the dark haired woman. By rights, they shouldn't be hiding anything from this family, not when it concerned something so important to them. That was not a good way to get in Vicky's good graces.

Surprisingly, Jessica offered her the explanation. Maybe it had something to do with the fact they weren't in the room with someone who could put a stop to the whole thing, or try to anyway. "It's how the turtle dragons got caught. It's called chaos crystal and it's a little harsh on a choice few."

Vicky thought that over as two of her group, Carrie and Bre, made sure the rear perimeter was still secure. Vicky held a bit of shock in at that, she was about to have Ty and Thane do the exact same thing...as Leo had taught her to do. She bit back the pain of grief that wanted to hit her and focused on her companion instead. Another thought hit her and her brow raised once it did. "A choice few that have relations to gods in some way? Because it obviously doesn't affect normal individuals or Thane wouldn't have been able to pick it up." Vicky gave Jessica a long, level look as they walked, something becoming more clear to her as she thought this through. "And by the way you two were acting on base...I'm assuming it affects you as well."

Jessica bit her lip a bit, but she didn't deny it.

Before Vicky could push the matter, Dante stopped at the rise that climbed up from the valley below. It was filled with trees and the path of the railway obviously cut through them, obvious by the line in in the canopy that indicated where the tracks ran. There was also something else down there. Dante swallowed hard as he pointed to the others. "I think we found them." His finger pointed to the four dragons laying calmly on their stomachs, patiently waiting for the train.

Vicky was immediately going to go down that slippery slope, but was halted by Cris' hand on her arm. "Wait..." Her eyes narrowed as she took a broader look at what was down in that clearing. "Look, they aren't alone." It was her hand that pointed this time, revealing what Vicky had previously overlooked. The clearing was crawling with what looked like some kind of band of troops. And there were a lot of them.

"What is going on?" Marina frowned as she also surveyed the area. Her eyes clearly telling everyone she wasn't liking what she was seeing. None of them were really.

"That's what we need to find out, and we aren't going to do it from up here." Vicky didn't wait for anyone else to stop her. Carefully she made her way down the steep slope, trying not to dislodge any loose rocks and dirt that could give her presence away. And she barely got started before the teens moved to go down in another direction as the turtle wives followed their impulsive leader. Jessica looked a little annoyed, but Vicky didn't really care. This family moved at their own speed, and Vicky trusted in the children to place themselves where they would do the most good. NEST chicks were just going to have to learn how they operate. And learn it quick too.

Maranda looked at the little sniper casually. "$20 if you can take out 10 guards in under 5 seconds without getting the attention of the turtle dragons, and while their family is still distracted with the climb down the slope."

"Might as well give me the money now" Carrie shrugged, it was going to be easy money. She put a silencer on her sniper, then laid low on her belly, taking aim, then started dropping guards like flies. The tiny woman also focused a moment even as her rounds sped towards their targets and their dead bodies were engulfed in the earth the second they hit the ground to hide them from other guards and not alert anyone. Finally she hit 10 in under 5 seconds, then got the ninja turtle dragons in her sights to make sure they haven't been alerted, then strapped her sniper back on her back.

"Meh, worth the money." Maranda held up a crisp, $20 bill for her little cousin to snatch up.

"Come on, let's go catch up. There are still some guards too close to the dragons to snipe, and I can't get them with an AK from here."

Maranda huffed. Sure they could shoot, and yes, even sneak, but they were all created for close combat, and battles, not so much missions. The N.E.S.T team began to follow the ladies, taking slightly different ways to not attract attention.

Vicky's team had by now made it to the bottom and carefully inched their way closer to the dragons still lying on the ground.

"Weren't there more guards?" Marina asked, her voice barely audible as she looked around a bit confused. "I could have sworn there were more guards..."

Cris just shrugged it off. "Does it matter? I'll beat the shit out of all of them."

Vicky ignored the conversation and inched even closer to Leo, her focus solely on reaching her turtle.

"Vicky!" Cris hissed at her. "What are you doing?"

"Getting my damn husband back!" Was the snapped, quiet reply. Then her voice shifted to ununderstandable mumbles as she grumbled a few not so nice things about stupid turtles getting into trouble, bad guys and the entire situation in general before she bit her tongue and inched ever closer.

Maranda walked up from behind Cris, who barely flinched at her approach. Cris had been training for years with ninjas afterall. "We should jump them..."

"Sneaking on the train might be good too." Jessica added. "Figure out what it is they are stealing. See if we can get pattern and figure out what the dickwad that took them over is planning in the mere future."

Carrie finally was able to pocket the 20 bucks now that they stopped moving. "You think they'll remember what they were doing once we snap them out of it? That'd be cool too, then we can just bring them down now." she offered.

"I don't think Vicky wants to wait..." Jessica calmly replied.

"Ho-ly crap...you remembered her name. Kodak moment..." Maranda said. Smart ass.

"Shh!" Girl needed to stay focused! Jessica looked at Cris and Marina with a shrug. They just looked back at her with raised eyebrows before they looked at each other and shrugged themselves. "What do you guys think? This is your gig too." Yes, she was trying to include them as best as she could. She wasn't used to consulting anyone on the field, and she wasn't used to having people on her team that didn't follow her exact orders down to a T like her cousins. Jessica watched the turtle dragons get ready. "And I'd hurry up with your answer..."

Bailey noticed Megan being really quiet, she usually had some really good inputs for strategical advances.

"You good?"

"I ran from Prowl.. He's going to be so mad when I get back." She held her temples with a sigh.

"Megs..." Jessica checked the turtle dragons again, making sure she wasn't being too loud. "We need you to focus, they aren't in control of themselves. They could hurt people."

Megan stared off with a haunted expression, the coldness and hardness in her eyes was back tenfold. She looked so much older and scarred, but nodded. "Alright. I'm good. Too late to go back now anyway."

"Have some nice make up sex, it'll all be good." Maranda oh so kindly added. Megan gave her an irritated look, but waved her off. Carrie couldn't help an annoyed and embarrassing facepalm.

Vicky had gotten close enough by now that she could almost touch Leo's tail tip. She so much wanted to touch him, to reassure herself that this was indeed her missing love. To have the feel of him against her skin again. She was so close to him...

The sound of an incoming train horn sounded out loudly in the valley.

"It's time!" One of the soldiers shouted out then. "Get them ready!"

And with those few words Leo stood up and his tail slipped out of her reach. Vicky's mouth began to mouth out every curse she knew and any combination she could put them in, her head bobbing with the vehemence she forced them out.

The train made it's appearance then, coming around the bend that led into the valley. Once it did, the dragons took to the air, their eyes intently watching it as it rapidly closed in. In moments they would sink their claws into it and it would be a repeat of what she saw on the news. Desperation to stop that from happening forced her onto her feet and the words were ripped out of her throat before she could stop them. "God damn it!" She shouted loudly in her frustration. "Leo! Don't!"

That of course clued all the guards in that they weren't alone anymore and Vicky suddenly found herself in the middle of a whole bunch of unwanted attention.

Cris rolled her eyes as she brought her hanbo out of it's holder. "I think that just answered the question if we should do something or not!" She informed her companions before she came out of her crouch in a run, her hanbo already twirling around her as she closed in on her loose lipped sister. With their cover now blown, all of them came to their feet and explode into motion as the train began to pass.

"Fuuuuuck..." Vicky muttered as she realized what she had set off. Her hands went to her own belt and the asps came out and were extended before her mouth finished getting the word out. Vicky engaged the group that surrounded her. Anger fueled her movements as she caught one guard and slammed his head into a tree. Repeatedly and in rapid succession. Then she cleared the rest out with a leaping circle kick before she again ran towards the dragons, calling out to them as she went.

Leo had barely made it off of the ground and just hovered there, his eyes blinking in confusion at her calls. If she could only reach him, maybe she could-

A blow hard enough to knock the wind out of her connected with her side and sent her to the ground, groaning as her arm held the spot that was throbbing like hell now. God _damn_ that smarts!

Maranda quickly pulled her AK and started executing goons, left and right, yelling to her cousins in a different language, then threw her knife in the air. Megan dove over her, kicking the knife straight through a head of a goon. Then she ran at him, dodging bullet fire with grace and precision. She did a round off and snagged up the Bowie knife and threw it at another bad dude, and dove out of the way, pulling her glock and emptied some round into some men near her. Slitting a throat in one swipe with her knife and getting a few more shots in, dropping the men like flies.

Carrie was going hand on hand with a dude too. He managed to twist the knife from her hand, to which she calmly caught it with her foot, kicked it clean through his head. The second he went down she had her gun out, taking pristine head shots. One came up from behind her but she merely ignored him and kicked her knife that finally decided to come back down into the chest of another bad guy.

Maranda ran the dude coming up on her cousin through the chest with her knife and punched him away, then caught another blow from a goon, head butting him, and did a combo kick to a couple more trying to surround her. Then looked over at Vicky, keeping herself aware of the battle around her but knew her cousins were paying attention and were ready to aid her.

"I don't think so my dear." A smug voice reached her ears as she gasped for air. "He's not yours anymore, he's mine."

"No he isn't-" Vicky started to snap out, then stopped with wide eyes at who she was looking at. No...it couldn't be... "Bishop..."

The grin he gave her was full of gleeful malice as he looked down at her. "Let me prove it to you." His eyes never left the prone woman as he directed his words to the blue banded dragon. "Leonardo! Do be kind enough to pick up my cargo please."

Leo shook off his confusion and once again flew towards the train. Bishop smiled in amusement as his point was made before he stepped on Vicky's throat.

Jessica kicked Bishop off of her, sending him tumbling and rolling. Then grabbed her hand and lifted her back up to her feet, not taking her eyes off of the offender. "Alright. not liking you..." she decided with distaste. Well, in all reality, she liked a very few people of the human population.

Bishop just narrowed his eyes at this unexpected interruption. "You shouldn't have gotten involved." Jessica just stared at him, why did he sound like he was expecting/knew her? Dude was psychotic...

Vicky took that moment of distraction to run around the man and once again ran towards Leo who was already lowering himself to the still passing train with Raph. Their eyes searching as they seemed to wait for a particular train car to pass them by.

Someone beat her to it. Ty and Thane were in the trees near where the dragons hovered and they tossed their cousins out over the gap. Dante and Ari landed easily in light crouches on the dragon backs.

"Uncle Leo! Stop!" Ari pleaded as she hit. "You have to stop this!"

Dante was already running along the spine of Raph's back and was heading for his head. "Snap out of it! Since when do you work for the bad guys!"

Those large heads turned away from the train as they stared blankly at their passengers, and in that distraction the train moved on and the last car moved by the group unmolested. It now made it's way down the track towards it's destination, and it still had all its cargo.

Bishop let out a frustrated growl over the fact he didn't get what he had come here for, and he fueled the punch he gave Jessica with that frustration, knocking her away from him before he turned towards the dragons. "Change of plans my pets." His eyes lit up with evil amusement. "Finish them off instead."

"Well, that's pretty fucking rude to be honest" Maranda declared.

Leo's eyes immediately locked onto Ari. The blonde turtle found herself in a bit of a pickle when his mouth opened and that tell tale blue glow formed from deep in his throat. She wouldn't have time to get out of the way in time for that hit. "Uh oh..." The teen pursed her lips as that glow brightened. How in the heck was she going to get out of the way of this? ...Maaaan, this was going to hurt...


	7. Chapter 7

Ari was still staring down the throat of a fire breathing Leo who was about to barbecue her ass. She was so close to him he was going to hit her no matter what she did to evade. Then she wasn't alone. Bailey had somehow made it up there with the young turtle. Quickly she pulled the girl to her and spun with her around to where her back was facing Leo's mouth. Then, to Ari's pure shock and amazement, pure white wings unfolded from her back to fold protectively around Ari as Leo's breath came in one long stream. Bailey held firm, even as Ari was looking wide eyed at the wings that shielded her, then looked at her rescuer, not quite wanting to believe what she was seeing.

Bailey just gave her a slight smile and a wink. "I suppose you were going to find out sooner or later." Then she winced a bit, held Ari tighter and leapt up into the air, easily carrying her burden before she landed well out of Leo's range. Then she gently put Ari down and proceeded to flap the hell out of her severely burnt wing. "Ahhh ah! Ah! Hoooot!" she finally patted the fire and got it out, then glared a seething hole into Bishop when she saw the bald spot on her wing. It was a little red too, but healing.

Well, when Maranda saw the bald spot, she was about to laugh, but frantically smacked a hand over her mouth to keep from doing just that. The rest of the NEST soldiers just give her a sympathetic look. It was freaking embarassing to lose feathers on your wings! Let alone get bald spots like that.

Bailey snarled at Bishop viciously. This is why Maranda didn't laugh, when her cousin was pissed, any of them, you held your tongue. Bailey gave one big clap in Bishop's direction like when the Hulk is angry and claps his hands. Huh, actually pretty accurate to the scene. Anyway, this huge blast of air sent that dude very, very high, spinning in the air with the force alone. She watched with a glare as he hit several branches on the way down

"Piece of fucking shit" she growled. He was already on her shit list for taking innocent beings and brain washing them, but this? She puffed up her remaining feathers like a bird, with an angry huff.

Maranda and Carrie held their arms straight up into the air indicating field goal, then gave each other a high five that they thought about it at the same time.

Cris actually broke out into laughter at the dual field goal indicators, then was suddenly reminded that standing there laughing over stupid crap might not be the best idea when you have not thinking right dragons flying around. Or in Donnie's case, landing to squish her. "Shit!" She squeaked and proceeded to haul ass out of his drop zone, and the fire he sent her way.

Jessica watched her cousins, then slowly reached for her temples to hold them with one hand while muttering: "Oh my god... This is going to be a long day."

Vicky gave her fellow leader a long look as she pointed to the burnt winged Bailey. "Goes for both of us. When exactly where you going to tell me about that?"

"Next Tuesday? Tuesdays are bad days anyway, so..." Jessica just shrugged.

Dante was holding on for dear life. Simply because he had a firm grip on Raph's horn, and the big red banded dragon wanted him off. That massive head was shaking rapidly back and forth. "A-a l-lit-tle h-he-lp p-plea-ease!" Came the frantic call of the yellow masked turtle as his body was yanked in all directions.

Ari was running up Donnie's back while he was still distracted with Cris and didn't stop when she reached his head. Then she did a diveboard spring off of his snout and flew towards her ragdoll cousin in a forward somersault. Her hands found a secure grip on Dante as she flew past and pulled him with her as he momentum kept them both going. They disappeared into the nearby canopy of trees, unseen but not unheard as they crashed their way to the ground. Amongst the sounds of numerous branches breaking you heard, "Ow! Ow! _Ow!_ OOOOWWWW!" Then they came back into view as they both fell out of the tree and slammed into the ground. "Ouch! Damn it!" Ari got to her feet, now rubbing her tender backside where she landed. "That went so much better in my head..."

"Listen up ladies!" Jessica called to her team. "No swords for obvious reasons, and no guns. That one will just piss them off. Go against the turtle dragon of your element. We're here to catch them, not hurt them." Her cousins cautiously confronted a dragon each, watching them. They haven't fought this specific kind of dragon, and wanted to go at it slow and study them to know fully what their abilities consisted of. "Understood?" Jessica didn't really ask the question, it was an order if anything.

"Yes Supereon!" they all look determined and focused now.

Jessica shouted something in a foreign language, with a controlling strong tone, and her cousins began their advancement on the turtle dragon of their element. Jessica risked a glance at everyone

"You you guys good?"

"Just peachy." Vicky muttered back as she and Marina found themselves caught between Leo and Mikey. Frustration was rapidly filling her as she looked from Mikey, then to Leo. She tried to reach out to him, and found herself slamming into that mental block that was still just as firmly in place. She needed that bond to get through to him, and she couldn't use it. She was about to scream in frustration. He was right here in front of her, but he might as well have been on the other side of the moon or something. "Please! Leo it's me! Stop!"

He didn't stop. Not much anyway. He paused a moment, his foot stopping in mid air in the act of placing it down. Vicky caught onto it. "Leo..." Marina kept a cautious eye on Mikey as Vicky took a step towards her husband. "Leo please...don't do this..." His eyes met hers and for a moment she saw them soften. Then they went flat again and he lowered his head and lunged.

Vicky squealed in shock at how quickly he turned back. His head was coming rapidly towards her now, mouth open and all those sharp teeth aiming for her. Marina was dodging the mirror version in Mikey. Then the blue eyed woman firmly grabbed Vicky and leapt out of the way of that dragon jaw trap. Their heads slammed together just moment after Marina and Vicky cleared out of their way, now rolling across the ground.

Ty and Thane then were there to help the women to their feet as the dragons shook off the hit. Vicky's son was now trying to pull her farther back. "Mom! This isn't working!"

Vicky just snarled as she ripped her arm out of his hand. "I have to keep trying!" And her footsteps lead her straight towards the charging dragon.

This time there was no hesitation in him as he brought his head in low to snap at her once more. Ty tackled her out of the way of those jaws just shy of them snapping shut on her. "You can't get through to him!" He was just as frustrated as she was, but Vicky wasn't sure which parent he was actually frustrated with.

Megan drew Leo's attention from his family as she calmly walked up. She didn't even flinch when he sent a wave of dragon fire at her. She raised a hand, and sent a pulse of water right in his face, going in his mouth to extinguish the flames, up his nostrils, and into his eyes, right after she cut the stream off, she quickly spun in a reverse roundhouse kick into Leo's dragon face, sending him sliding on the ground.

Maranda got her first taste of Raph's temper as he brought his tail around and slammed the fuck out of her with it when she faced off with him. That hit sent her flying and she disappeared into the trees.

Thane winced a little at that. "I hope she's ok..." Then something dawned on him and his eyes grew wide. "Wait...they have fucking _wings_?" He stared at Maranda as she reappeared.

Maranda gave a low growl as she flew back out of the trees, gaining enough momentum so when her kick connected to Raph she had him skidding across the ground like his brother. Then flared her wings in a challenging manner, crouching a little. Her hand nabbed a twig from her hair, so much irritation built up, she put the twig between her fingers and flicked it away before getting ready for another strike. "Lucky shot reptile."

Dante stunned Thane right back out of his stupor as he ran by. And he did it by popping his cousin on the head. "Stay focused! Uncle Mikey on our ass!"

Thane turned to see his uncle stomping towards him. "Shit!" His tone and pitch matched his mother's exactly from when she spat out the same word earlier. Then he turned and hauled ass as he followed Dante.

Bailey twirled gracefully through the air, kicking Mikey away from them to get his attention on her. "Come on bud" the young brunette took a fighting pose, wings flared like one of those kick ass lizards off of Jurassic park, now that you have that image in your head, that's it, it's there to stay.

Marina and Caitlin were trying to get out of Donnie's way as he closed in on them, then the large dragon paused and looked at Carrie. Who gave him a look of strong disapproval, despite her fun size height, she was pretty motherly. She crossed her wrists together to stop his tail from hitting her, her feet slid a little at the force of impact, then she sand blasted him, not sure exactly how much power she could put behind her attack, they weren't suppose to hurt them after all.

Donnie brought up a wing to shield himself from those tiny particles, a low growl coming out of his throat. Finally he got annoyed enough to snap that wing down before he raised up onto his haunches and let himself just fall right on top of Carrie.

Carrie was faster than Donnie though, she scaled his wing, grabbed his head, twisting in the air, causing Donnie's head and neck to twist before his body followed and he just ended up doing a harmless flop on the ground.

"And his name is John Cena!" she rolled away from Don.

Donnie stomped a paw on Carrie before she could roll too far to hold her down. Then his head lowered with a menacing growl, Carrie caught it with her hands, looking up at him unamused, then moved his paw away from her and got ready for a different angle of an attack.

By this point all of the turtle family was staring at their companions. So far none had been able to match the dragons...but they were holding their own easily.

"What are they supposed to be?" Thane asked, more than a little bewildered. "Superpowered fairies or somethin'?"

His family just shrugged, not sure what to tell him. They quickly knew they were outmatched in this fight, on both ends. All they could do was watch as these two forces collided.

Raph had rolled back to his feet and came right back in. His jaws snapping viciously and Maranda dodging and weaving out of the way of those very sharp teeth. Finally Raph got a deep bite on Maranda's shoulder, who ignored it so she can pivot on her heals and give Thane a: "really mother fucker?" look. She grumbled and waited for Raph to release her in order to breathe fire. When he did, she held her hand up, stopping it in midair and collected it into a ball. Then threw it right back in his face. "Doesn't feel so good does it!" A nice Spartan kick to the chest sent him down to the ground again.

Raph just threw another one at her, standing while she was distracted. And when she went to deflect it, his paw connected with her and she went to go visit the trees again.

The turtle family just calmly watched her as she went by over their heads.

"That's getting to be a habit." Thane noted.

"Yup." TY agreed calmly.

Mikey rolled with the hit he received from Bailey and stopped on his feet, digging his claws in to put a halt to his momentum. He looked at this tiny woman in front of him, blinking in confusion. Then those eyes narrowed as he sized her up before he turned and promptly plopped his backside down right on top of her.

Vicky facepalmed. "Even in brainwash mode he does Mikey crap..."

White aura built around Mikey's big, dragon ass, and wind slammed up into Mikey, shooting him straight up, several feet, so Ariel could angrily get up and stomp away from the now falling dragon. "Fucker sat on me!" She actually wasn't that angry with him, it was more of a pout. Internally her emotions were a mix of "WTF" and a: "so I can cross that off my bucket list, dragon sitting on me, your argument is invalid"

Bre and Jessica tried desperately not to laugh at their cousin.

"Well. Sure sign he's in there somewhere." Jessica muffled her laughter

Mikey recovered in the air and glided back to the ground and circled Bailey, his head held low and lips pulled back into a snarl. Bailey spread her wings at him, doing what Maranda was doing, challenging him.

Leo's tail came up behind Megan and connected with her hard enough to send her into the air over him and she landed on his other side in a roll before she got back to her feet with her momentum, calmly looking at him.

She turned to face Leo. Tilting her head at him, as if she was trying to tell him something, her blue eyes burning a hole into his reptile ones.

Bre and Jessica noticed it and looked at her "Aqua! You good?" Bre asked. What did they call her? Aqua? Well, it made sense based on her powers, but, did they give themselves false names? Like, in all seriousness?

Megan or Aqua, apparently nodded her head and charged Leo.

But on the other hand, Leo met that gaze and seemed held by it while she was all but starting into his soul. He stared at her intently, his own eyes searching. Then to the surprise of his watching family...he shook his head in confusion and even backed up a step.

Vicky cautiously walked closer, her hope rising in her chest at this sight. "Leo? Please love...it's us. Snap out of it..."

Again his head shook and another step was taken away from them all. Vicky bit her bottom lip as she watched.

Ty was next to her now. "Dad, we know you're in there...you can beat this."

His head shook even harder this time. He paused a moment, his confused eyes looking at those in front of him. Even from where she was standing she could see the tear slide down his cheek as he watched them. Then those eyes took on that distant look again before he roared loudly at them. His wings flared out and lifted him into the air and flew west, with his brothers following. Heeding a call their family couldn't hear.

Megan lowered her head with a sigh, but sucked her emotions back up into their rightful void, making herself recover, then traveled back over to her leader for orders.

"Leo!" Vicky screamed, her hope gone and heartbroken as she watched him fly off. "Damn it! Come back!" Tears filled her eyes as she collapsed to her knees and sat on her legs, the sense of defeat washing over her. "Come back..."

Ty sighed as he pulled his mother back onto her feet and into his arms. "You tried Mom."

"So close!" Vicky began to sob into his chest. "We were so close... If I could just get past that damn spirit block...but I can't..." She cried harder against Ty. And he just held her, not knowing what else to do as his own anguish crossed his features.

"Supereon" Megan said to get Jessica's attention as she watched the dragons take flight again. Sure they could chase them down, but there was no cure for them and no way to keep them trapped and secured, so going after them was pointless right now.

"What is it Aquarius?"

"What are we going to do?"

Jessica could only watch them with her, for once, she didn't know, but they needed to act fast.


	8. Chapter 8

Maranda walked back out of the woods while everyone else was watching the dragons fly off with disappointment and for others, devastation.

"I am going to drop that bitch ass mother fucking cum stained cock sucker into next Tuesday!" Maranda roared. Her cousins couldn't help but to let out a soft chuckle at her. She was just strolling along, pulling twigs from her hair and glared at Raph as he took off, still barely within sight him and his brothers were so far away.

"Yeah you better fly bitch!" She called. Great, competition between the hotheads, anyone else seeing that go down the drain faster than a snail race? Wait, those are actually a thing, they even made a movie out of it. We are getting way off topic here...

Megan tailed her cousin angrily, and swatted her upside the head, hard.

"We're not here to make anymore rivalries then we already have! So knock it off!" she gave her cousin a seething look.

Maranda had to hold her head with both hands because the smack was so hard, she looked at the girl called Aqua with shock, the rest of the NEST girls did too.

"You sure you're alright Aqua?"

"...yes Supereon."

"We'll talk about it back on base. We can't follow them. Yet. It's pointless when we don't know how to get through to them. But now we know more of what we're dealing with. But we _will_ get them back." Jessica promised. She had wanted to fight, so did her sister, but they don't know how much the turtles can really take. She knew it was probably a lot since they did a pretty dang good job holding their own in this fight. But Jess has seen angry turtles wives and children, she wasn't risking it. Plus she would feel guilty if something were to happen to them, she liked their personalities, even brainwashed they weren't so bad.

"Yeah, it's personal now. If I see that Bishop guy again? I'll fucking skin him." Bailey growled. This is one of the more peaceful cousins! She is going to skin Bishop! You know you gone done fucked the hell up!

Maranda and Carrie watched Bailey, not necessarily scared but they were sure as hell taking her seriously, backing up a little while they examined their pissed cousin.

"Dante. You know what that train was carrying?" Jessica was glad her cousins were going to put their heart and soul into this, Jessica just wanted to solve this mystery on how to bring the turtles back and back to her original goal.

"Another chemical." The teen answered. "I'll see if I can get you a full manifest once we get back of everything that was taken and what they tried to take here."

Thane was looking at the previously so cocky Maranda with a smug look. "Dad isn't as much of a pushover as you thought he was...huh?"

"So he got a couple lucky shots in. It won't happen again" a dark expression, like storm clouds crossed her face. But the thing is about Maranda, she was a lot like Raph in temper, and this might come as a surprise to you, but she actually has a Mikey personality in that head of hers. She was actually a softy. Shocker.

Cris popped her son, her eyes angry. "That's not funny Thane! They were our only hope of stopping them!"

"Ow..." Thane rubbed his head where she just nailed him. "Does the term child abuse mean anything to you?" Cris popped him again.

"That means no." Maranda matter of factly told the black masked turtle.

"Alright. We'll figure out that as well while we wait." Jess told Dante, internally rolling her eyes at her goofy cousins.

Jessica hit her comm link "Jazz? Can we get a bridge pretty please?" within moments, a ground bridge formed. "Thanks man." she messed with her comm link again to hang it up.

Maranda, Megan, and Bailey tucked their wings in and started to head through, giving her bloodied shoulder a good stretch "Same time tomorrow?"

"Hell no. We are heading to our base where Ratchet is and going from there. We'll be heading out again by tonight. We need to figure everything out quickly." Jessica replied back, Bailey was right, it was personal, Bishop was a fucking dick within meeting him of mere minutes, but these poor people have known him and dealt with him for a long time, and she took great pity on them. She was going to be fixing some stuff here, starting with the turtles that fell victim to the dick stain.

"We'll head to our base." Dante told the winged group. "Kyle can open us a gate. I need to get you that manifest off of the computer...and it seems we need to get some members of this family to sleep." He looked pointedly at the exhausted mothers.

"Bite your tongue young man!" Cris snapped at him. "I'm fine!"

Thane pushed her slightly with a fingertip and she stumbled a few feet. "Yup...you suuuure are."

Cris glared at her son.

"And you wonder why you get hit." Maranda snickered at the young mini Raph, he was less dragony, not by a lot, he had the reptilian skin, so there was that.

"Uh you guys sure you want to go back to that base? You might be sleeping in the brig tonight. I'm sure Prowl is still patrolling for you." By this point, all of the NEST soldiers but Jessica had made it through.

Ty just reacted calmly to that warning, even had a hint of a smile on his face. "I'd like to see him try." Thane and Ari snickered even as Ty turned back to comforting his upset mother.

"You really have no clue on how we operate." Dante grinned at her. "There isn't a brig they can come up with that will hold us. Our fathers taught us better."

"Not that he has the nuts to try." Thane jerked his heads towards Cris who was suddenly fuming.

"They better not put my boy in the damn brig! I'll poke his damn optics out! With toothpicks!"

"And you guys don't know how the twins and Jazz operate apparently. Those brigs can hold them. Well, then again, Aqua might distract him tonight. Meh, I bid you good luck then. I'll see you guys soon to see what we have for a plan." She stepped through he bridge and it closed behind her.

Thane and Dante looked at each other amused after she left.

"She really doesn't get it, does she?" Thane asked with a raised ridge.

"She will soon enough I suppose." Dante shrugged.

Ty just rolled his eyes as Kyle opened their way home. He began to pull his mother towards the ground bridge, and she was stumbling with every step. Her grief and exhaustion finally catching up with her. "Come on Mom. You need to get some sleep. You're exhausted and it's not helping." Vicky just nodded numbly and let her son lead her back.

Once on the other side, Ty sighed as he caught sigh of another worried family member. Lavi was waiting by Kyle at the control panel. Her face held hopeful anticipation as she stood there, wringing her hands. "Where are they?"

Ty shook his head, and watched the hope fall out of her just as it did with his mother. "We...couldn't get them Lavi..."

Grief took over then as her lips began to tremble. Kyle left his station to quickly take her in his arms and she buried her head into his neck and began to cry. Dante was the one who walked over and shut the bridge down after they all walked through. Then he stood there with his hand resting on the handle as he looked over the faces of those around him. He fought back his own surge of anguish at the fact they came home empty handed. "I'll...go get that list she wanted." He said quietly before he left the room. Dante at least had busy work to keep him occupied, the others had nothing really to distract them from the worry gnawing at them.

.

.

Megan watched the ocean below thoughtfully as she sat on the cliff side, swinging her legs. Her face still locked into a cold expression, and one she couldn't help.

"You good? I know this probably isn't easy for you" Jessica sat beside her. Heights didn't bother them, for obvious reasons. Instead they actually soothed them, especially being surrounded or near their element. It was just comforting. It was a little harder for Jessica to be near her element, but, she was glad her sis and cousins could.

"It's not" Megan admitted, she had a load of shame to add to that, this situation really was tearing her apart. "Lots of memories. Ones I didn't even think I could remembered even" she scrubbed her face.

"The past is in the past. You've learned your lesson. And you've yet to lose your humanity again. You've been doing fine. And we'll love you no matter what." Jessica promised. She hugged her cousin, yes, she could be gooey lovey dovey to her family every now and then, especially when they needed the support.  
The hug made her smile slightly but it didn't last very long. Something else was wrong with the blonde, let's see if she will spill.

"Now what else is going on?"

"You don't remember... do you?" And Megan then proceeded to remind Jessica of something that had happened a long time ago.

That, uh, that was a long talk, and a mind blowing, "Oh holy crap how the fuck... Just, how?" kind of conversation that Megs and Jessica needed to recover from with a walk together. Jess' perspective on the situation changing dramatically. She also felt guilty and made a silent promise she'll do better, and she'll figure this thing out. Only now did she understand that she owed it to them.

"You good now?" She quietly asked her cousin.

"Not really. Still need to face prowl" Megan added, though she sounded a little amused at that one.

"That is a personal problem you two need to fix." the two girls were heading back to the med bay where everyone else was, especially Carrie, in her office, trying to figure out how the hell they could counteract the damn mind control. "Come on. He's so soft with you. He'll probably sentence you to one night in his office and you won't even be mad about that one." Jessica winked at her cousin, and she was so right too, no mater how embarrassed Megan got or tried to deny.

Megan did indeed facepalm and blushed madly. "Good lord Supereon." Ah, you see? Embarassed, her and Carrie were both like that, easily embarrassed about stuff like that, especially if it was implied to someone.

Jessica smiled and nudged her as they walk into the medbay. Jess immediately went for Armonius and picked the little boy up put of his crib stationed in the med bay.

"Has he been passing all his health stuff Ratchet?"

"He is a very healthy mechling." the med bot replied. "But I still need to run tests to make sure his development stays healthy." Jessica figured that and she had no problem with it. She was going to be excessively cautious with her little one. Jess propped him up on her hip and walk over to Carrie.

"Any luck on getting through to them?" to which, Carrie shook her head with frustration,

"Nothing. From the results Starblast gave me. That tech is wedged to deep. Even removing the tech. The effects are long lasting. Wireless almost. it is very embedded within their mind." Carrie frowned. She loved a good challenge, but Bishop has been putting chaos crystal on them. To keep them weak and keep them in his control. She knew something was fighting it, along with the turtles themselves, like their core or entity but it can't get through because of the chaos crystal. That stuff is lethal to mystical beings, and it was killing them, so this wasn't fun, it was stressful.

"It's alright. We'll figure something out. Keep cracking at it. You're doing just fine." Jessica sat by her, Armonius on her lap as she was attempting to help her cousin figure this out. She wasn't much help with computers, but Jazz and her sister in law Lindsey were teaching her, she was working on it she smiled at her little boy when he started to play with a strand of her hair brown hair.

"What you doing bud?" she smiled and there her hair goes, right into his little mouth, bleh.

"Oh gross. Mama was rolling around in the dirt. You don't want that in your mouth." she informed him and lightly pulled it away from him. "Even baby mechs just love to put stuff in their mouths." Jessica noticed. She began to work on her computer, while Armonius Prime was babbling to her in sparkling chatter. It made her happy he was so active and talkative and she smiled and nodded her head as he spoke. And then Nemesis decided to make an entrance into the medbay, uhhh oh. Jessica's face went grim, and she only kept eye contact with Armonius "Mama is in trouble." she told her little one. She wasn't joking around either. She respected the fact that Nemesis was mad, and he had the right to be, she disobeyed a direct order and caused him to worry, no matter her cause.

Armonius continued to babble at her, but get this, it almost sounded like it was in a scolding manner now. She raised a brow at him, geez, so much like his father. "Oh man, not you too, I'm outnumbered" Jessica sighed.

Nemesis gently took Armonius from Jessica to put him in his sparkling hold and the young mech happily and eagerly climbed in to be near Neme's spark. Once he was in the comfy, enclosed, and soundproof confines, Nemesis couldn't help but to smile at the little one. Jessica loved how Nemesis was with her and Armonius, it just made her so happy, but then he looked at Jessica more firmly, oh yeah, she was in trouble. She got a little caught up in the adorable moment, sue her. Nemesis held a hand out to her, and she sighed, stepping on to his hand and accepting her fate, Nemesis carried her up and out of the medbay so that they could talk, he was so not happy.

Jessica's cousins on the other hand thought it was hilarious when she got into trouble with them, bunch of jack asses... She gave them back a glare. They all looked smug but went back to helping Carrie with whatever they were doing in order to help the process along while Nemesis and Jess got out of the medbay.

Carrie smacked her head on the table in frustration, this was bothering her oh so freaking much and she wanted to go out there and just beat something up! "Oh. My. Fucking. God! There has to be something we can do!" She snarled.

"Could we just catch them and remove the tech controlling them? That would be a start." Megan offered.

"Yes, let's keep them in our kick ass dragon withstanding cells. Oh wait.." Carrie said, couldn't sound more sarcastic.

"Point taken..jerk." Great, Carrie was getting tired, which meant, crabby.

"Did the moon just change color?" Maranda asked curiously.

"I don't know, did you finally find a drug that effects us?" Carrie shot back, man, her sass though.

"No. She's right.. oh shit. You don't think?" Oh Megan really, really hoped she was wrong in her theory.

"This isn't going to end well." Carrie hoped Megs was wrong too, because she really, really didn't want to see him, any of them. Worthless cunts...that's what they were.

.

.

Once again the rec room became the gathering point for this exhausted family. Lavi and Vicky were sleeping on the couches as Caitlin sat in a big fluffy easy chair that allowed her to look unseeing out the nearby window. The only sound in the room was the quietly clacking of Dante's fingers as the ran over the keyboard of his laptop. Marina walked over to stand curiously next to him.

"What are you doing son?" She asked, more of a need to hear something in the depressing silence than out of any tech interest.

"Hoping me getting shook around like a rag doll on Uncle Raph's head paid off." Danter muttered quietly.

MArina raised a questioning brow at that. "I thought you were going to pull up a manifest?"

"Oh that? I already did. It's sitting right there." He pointed to the paper lying in front of him on the table.

"Ok...then can I have a better explanation?"

Dante sighed as he leaned back in his chair, then rubbed his own tired eyes. "I shoved a tracker into Uncle Raph's horn. I'm hoping that it hasn't been found, but it's a small one. Not much signal strength too it. I'm trying to bounce the receiver signal off of all kinds of towers and antennas hoping to pick it up.

"Not working huh."

"No...either it's being blocked or I haven't found the right area yet. Heck...I don't even know if it will work in his turtle form if I planted it on his dragon form. We never had a reason to test those theories out."

Cris and Ty made their way in the room, he carrying a large container of soup and she a large platter of bowls spoons and sandwiches. Bot arm loads were place gently on the table near Dante with a heavy sigh from Cris.

"It smells good." Caitlin said quietly from her chair, still looking out the window. "But I'm not hungry."

"You think I am?" Cris asked her back as she scooped out some soup into the bowls.

Ty took his blonde Aunt a bowl of soup and a grilled cheese sandwich. "Eat Aunt Cait. I know none of you have been taking care of yourselves the last few days."

"Any more news?" She asked hopefully as she turned towards him.

"No." He replied as he shook his head. "It's been quiet all afternoon. They haven't been spotted again after they flew off."

She nodded in return, but blinked back the tears as she took the food from him. Ty then walked over towards his mother as the grumbles of Dante met his ears, he still couldn't do what he was trying to do. Marina smiled a little at him. "So much like your Dad..."

Dante just grumbled some more.

When Ty place a hand on Vicky's shoulder to wake her, she shot up into a sitting position, her eyes looking wildly around with hope...that soon faded again. "Easy Mom. I'm just trying to get you to eat something."

Cait was looking out the window again, quietly eating her sandwich halfheartedly as she stared out will dull eyes. Then she narrowed her eyes a little as she tilted her head. "That's odd..."

"What's odd?" Cris asked her.

Caitlin looked hard out the window again a moment before she shook her head. "Nothing...I'm...just stressed and seeing things I guess. I could have sworn I saw someone outside, but there's no one there."

Marina laid a comforting sympathetic hand hand on the woman's shoulder.

Dante finally got frustrated enough to where when he got to his feet he knocked his chair over as he glared down at his screen. "I just can't find them!"

Ty gave his cousin a probing look before walking over to guide him out of the room. "Come on, let's go take a walk cousin. Some fresh air will do good in clearing your head."

They walked right by the sleeping Lavi who didn't even wake up from the noise. Vicky looked sadly at her resting daughter as Cris handed her a sandwich. "This should be a happy time for her...for all of us..."

"I know Vic." Cris sighed in agreement. "I know."

Once again silence filled the room.


	9. Chapter 9

Nemesis walked back into the medbay, still carrying Jessica in his palm, they both looked much better after their talk, and it didn't even take that long.

"You have the little one for the rest of the night? I don't know if I'll be sleeping tonight." Jessica said with a sigh.

"Don't do that to yourself love." Nemesis didn't like to see her push herself so excessively hard, and she always did. He knew her better though and knew her answer.

"This is important, and is bothering the shit out of me, especially now." she told him, he nodded in understanding, but he wasn't going to try to hold her back, it would cause more harm than good, especially with how stubborn Jessica is.

"I understand" he kissed the top of her head with his lip plates, she smiled at the affection, there was never a day when little kisses like that just didn't make her in a better mood along with talks with him.  
She hugged his neck "Love you."

"I love you too Starstriker." he too couldn't help a smile and and set her down, then walked out of the medbay so that she could work with her cousins.

"I could not have gotten any luckier and more blessed with that one." Jessica sighed happily. truer words have never left her mouth, she curiously turned to Carrie "Figure out anything?"

"Yes, we figured out something within the 10 minutes you were away" Carrie, again, with the freaking sarcasm!

"Someone is getting crabby.." she made a note

"Someone wants to get hit." alright, that was a pretty good comeback Jess gives her that one, note to self, long nights like this, bring a sacrifice of coffee to her cousin.

"Striker." Starblast watched as the moon became more gold, she had much distaste in that.

"Oh, hell fucking no. My last conversation with that dick wad was one of thee worst. He summons us, I will beat him to an inch of his life." and just like that, good feeling's gone. God this night was going down the shitter, too much of it, where was the damn plunger? Jessica let out a frustrated growl "Looks like the ass munches of the north are summoning us."

"I hate everything..." If it was even possible, Carrie seemed even more displeased with the situation, poor girl. Jessica will have to get her some coconut donuts after this or something in order to make her feel better.

Maranda was just giving barely audible grumbles, while Megan just glared at the moon, poor Megs had one of the biggest reasons to hate them.

The luminosity became almost unbearably bright gold, lighting up the entire medbay, and the NEST girls found themselves at very large, very elaborate golden gates, ones they wished they would never have to step foot near ever again.

"Let's go" Jessica was rubbing her temples as she lead the way in, it wasn't long upon entering they saw their fathers, sitting their lazy asses, in their giant ass thrones, which Maranda, Jessica, and Bre, would like to set on fire, with them burning away with said thrones. "What do you want?" Jessica snapped, getting right to the point. She wanted to get the fuck out of here and the only way she could do that is hearing them out, saying no, and then leaving while flipping the worthless pieces of shit off!

"I want you to stop wasting your time on a different group of gods' mistakes. If they don't know how to control their pets, or not be outwitted by them, hence allowing loopholes? Leave them." Photo, Jessica and Bre's father, said in a low angry voice. Just listen to these conversations a little longer, you will want them dead as much as their damn daughters do, if you don't already.

"No" now that that was out of the way, Jessica wanted to do the leaving part, but it was never that easy. Not with her father. Photo raises a brow dangerously. Oh, oh, the light god was so scary, oh, whatever shall she do? Crabby Carrie has nothing on Jessica in the sarcasm range right now.

"You will do as I say. You are-"

Jessica's anger popped, it couldn't be withheld in the confines of her mind anymore. "I am not your fucking weapon, I am not just some "hybrid that just gains power for our faction" as you put it very recently. I am not a _slave!_ Not anymore. And in particular. I am not _your_ slave." she snarled at the god, her eyes cold and angry, she wanted to beat the shit out of him, so badly. "So if you're not going to help us? Butt the fuck out!" Jessica growled.

"Then just kill them. You need to figure out how to defeat Un. Not save worthless beings like those creatures."

"We're saving some turtle dragons and their families, not you guys." Jessica retorted back. Like she would save them, if someone had a hold of them, the only reason he would save them is so that she could get the last blow on them, finish the douche bags off herself. "You'll have to think of a lot better of a method than to just have us kill them" Jessica crossed her arms

"I don't have to take orders from you." Photo sneered at her.

Jessica rolled her eyes. "You know what? You don't, you're right. But guess what? My cousins and I don't have to take them from you. Defeating Amauro put me on the same rank as him. Same rank as _you_. I don't have to do jack shit for you." Jessica wanted him to try to attack her, she wanted him to feel frustrated and angry as he has made her her entire existence! Which was a very long time by the by. "And you can't say _anything_ bout it." Come on, attack her, make her freaking day, she will kick the shit out of him.

.

.

Marina suddenly shivered. The rec room suddenly felt much colder to her. Cold and ominous. "Is it me...or does it feel...bad in here?" She asked her sister turtle wives as she rubbed her arms to try and warm them back up.

"Like something bad is hovering just out of sight?" Cris asked, her own arms sprouting goosebumps. Marina just gave her an agreeing nod as she continued to rub her arms. "Yeah...I feel it too." Cris acknowledged.

"Over trained maybe?" Vicky asked as she also tried to rub warmth back into her extremities. She really didn't look to convinced of that either.

"Then why do I feel it too..." Cait quietly asked. "I'm no fighter."

Then, just as quick as the cold feeling hit, it was just as quickly washed away by a sense of warmth and the room seemed to brighten a little. They looked shocked at each other, they had felt this once before. Suddenly they didn't feel so alone.

Cait looked around the room, her eyes hopeful. "You...don't think..." She trailed off with a slight smile. The first one on her face since the guys went missing.

Vicky's eyes also brightened a little as she shook her head. "I don't know what to think anymore... But it would make sense. She does genuinely care about them."

They were so caught up in the feeling and the renewed hope it brought that none of them noticed Dante's laptop glow a soft white a moment before a consistent flash showed up on his screen.

Lavi did notice it. She woke up and stared long and hard at that screen and what it told her. Then she got up and quietly left the room, determination in her steps as she went. She knew if she said anything they wouldn't let her go, and god damn it, she was going to go. Something deep inside her told her she had to go. She didn't know why, but she listened to that prompt, regardless of the fact that she was going to probably get called out on it later. At this point, she didn't care as her feet led her towards the ground bridge.

.

.

"Stubborn child." Photo gave her a seething look.

"Condescending god! You are all the fucking same! but I must thank you. You give us an example of what not to be. And ass biting motivation to keep true to ourselves. Is there anything else you want from us before we get back to our task at hand. Because I am pretty sure this conversation is finished" come on, they got the 'no' part down, all they had to do now is leave.

"Please let this conversation be over. I fucking hate it here" Maranda crossed her arms and grumbles continued through her throat as she had her small fit.

Megan gave a curt nod of agreement, while glaring a hole into her father, if looks could kill, her look could kill him, bring him back to life angrily, and kill him again, he screwed her over so immensely and she _knew_ he felt no remorse for it, she wanted to beat his face in.

"You _will_ listen to me! I am your father" going to the desperate arguments now, which still weren't going to work Jessica kept her arms crossed, giving him her own seething glare while she wondered what his next move was going to be. He was unpredictable, she was usually pretty good about thinking on the fly, but she was still nervous nonetheless

"I had a father. a couple actually, they are both dead. You might have given life to me, but that is all you are to me, I will never call you father again." Photo growled, he didn't care about the fact that Jess's cousins and her weren't going to ever see him and his godly companions as fathers, he was mad he couldn't use his last excuse to control them, tough shit, score for the cousins and sisters, it was past time to leave.

"Come on, we're leaving" Jessica growled, leading her cousins and sister to the doors, they were all too eager to get the fuck out of here with her, and stayed on her tail, the doors were in her reach. Maranda flipped her dad off as a goodbye, oh, did Jessica forget to introduce them? Pyro: douchebag god of fire, Hydro: douchebag god of water, Geo: douchebag god of earth and Aero: which, you guessed it, douchebag god of air, there was Amauro, but

Jessica killed that fucker when he tried to enslave her. their wives can't be introduced, because they have been long dead, they were amazing mothers though, let's just leave it at that.

"Alright child. You wish to not listen? We'll get through to you using other means" oh shit, what was he planning? Jessica turned around just in time to see a flash of light, and Jessica's heart dropped, oh shit.

"Oh don't you fucking dare" Jessica gave him a look of death, sure they got off of the wrong foot, but not only were the women that popped up and glowing in his aura bubbles ones she now unofficially vowed to protect, but they were growing on her cousins and herself, they were becoming friends. And she knew what he was about to do, and just somehow knew they would accept it, and it won't be anything pleasant.

Photo brought the illuminated floating forms of the turtle's wives before him. Then cut the power, making them fall on the ground so they were all awake and can fully engage in a conversation with him, or he might just kill them if they got on his nerves enough. All in all, he was going to get a win out of this night, either they suffered: a death by him, or one, very painfully by their husbands, ones he was going to enjoy watching...


	10. Chapter 10

With that same determination in her, Lavi strode into the empty control room. That in itself was odd sign, there usually was was always somebody in here. Lavi didn't give it any thought. She just marched right up to the panel she needed, the panel that activated the ground bridge. Her hands moved swiftly, having been taught by Kyle on how to operate it, and plugged in the coordinates she had memorized from Dante's laptop. Before she could pull the lever to open it however, a hand reached around her to grab her wrist.

"What are you doing?" Ty asked her, his tone furious. Dante came walking up behind them, his face a little concerned over what he and Ty had just walked in to.

"I'm going to find Father! That's what!" Lavi snapped as she tried to rip her arm out of her brother's grasp. He wasn't letting go though.

"Lavi..." Ty rubbed his face in exasperation. "We've already had this conversation."

She glared at him as she tried to pull her arm free again. "Let me go!"

"No sis. He wouldn't want that. You know that as well as I do."

"He also doesn't want to be doing this!" She finally managed to free her arm and tried to open the bridge again.

And Ty blocked her from reaching it. "No Lavi!"

By this point their argument caught the attention of their missing cousins.

"What the hell is going on now?" Thane grumbled as he and Ari approached.

Ari was a bit quicker to catch on after she took everything in with a glance. "Come on Lavi. Ty's got a point. Not even your mom could get through to him, he could seriously hurt you.

Anger and frustration filled the young turtle as she was once again outnumbered. Her jaw clenched with the outburst she was trying to contain. "Fine!" She snarled through those clenched teeth. "I'll just sit here while they are out there doing who knows what!" She turned and stomped away.

Ty shook his head with a sigh as he turned to his cousins. "Sometimes she's worse than mother." He mumbled.

"C'mon Ty." Dante replied. "I can kinda understand where she is coming from. She's just worried is-"

Dante cut off in shock as Lavi came suddenly running back up towards them, her eyes determined. She easily flipped over her brother and landed lightly on the control panel before kicking the switch to activate the ground bridge. Before her stunned sibling could turn and grab her, she was already flipping off and ran through the now open portal and ran right through it without even looking back.

Ty stared dumbfounded a moment before he started cursing violently under his breath. "Lavi!" He thundered as he quickly followed. "Get back here!"

Thane just rolled his eyes as he followed the twins and the remaining cousins followed him before the bridge closed back up behind them, leaving them trapped on the other side.

.

.

"Mortals do you wish to help your mates?" was the first words I heard after landing very hard on my bottom. I didn't know the voice, the male voice, and right off the bat I couldn't even pinpoint him until it dawned on me that it came from behind me. I cautiously turned to face the man, men I should say. There were a group of them, and they were all looking at me and the others with a look of something resembling contempt. I resented that right off the bat. I didn't even know them and they didn't like me. At least give me the chance to piss you off before you judge me.

Caitlin was looking around with wide eyes, her breathing coming in quick, frightened pants as she took everything in.

Cris wasn't as reserved with her initial reaction as she got to her feet. "What the hell! Someone is going to pay for that!" She was rubbing her butt. "Which one of you ass munches do I slap!"

That one earned Marina's hand slapping over her mouth as she cooly studied our surroundings. "Cris...um...I think this is more than it seems at the moment..."

Our feisty turtle sister wife slapped that hand right back off again. "I don't care! I'll still punt kick their ass! Who did that!"

I got slowly to my feet, trying to take everything in even as I restrained the urge to pummel someone myself. That shit hurt. It was then my shocked eyes noticed Jessica as she came running up, her face a mix of fear and anger. "Do not believe a fucking word he says! You think the Japanese gods are ass holes? These cock suckers are even worse." She grabbed my arm and pulled me to my feet even as her team closed in, shooting the men stares that could kill an elephant. Now wasn't that a cheery sight... Stuck in fluffy cloud land with individuals that obviously didn't get along. My turtle sense was tingling, and I didn't like it.

"I will give you a hundred dollars," Maranda told Cris "to punch that fucker, right there, in the face." She pointed to one of the men. The boss man I was assuming, since he was the one standing there with the most high and mighty expression.

"That money isn't worth her life." Jessica flatly replied, still just a glaring away.

"Answer my question humans." Ok, so it was Mr. High and Mighty that talked. And he really wasn't getting on my good side. I _did_ have a name, and it really wasn't too hard to ask it. Call me human...pfft... Asshat. Who the hell was this guy anyway?

"Why do you have to drag humans into our bull shit!" Jessica flared. "Send them back!"

"You should have killed those champions when you had the chance." He replied. Now wait just a god damn minute...

"And you should have just butt out." Jessica snarled at him, then her hands and eyes started glowing this creepy black color. I blinked a little on that one. Had no idea why I was surprised, already guessed by now that our new friends weren't what they appeared to be.

And Jessica wasn't the only one not happy. Cris' eyes flared dangerously. "You mother fucker..." Cris was known for her talent with throwing weapons, and she proved to everyone why when a kunai launched out of her hand before Marina could stop her. "How fucking _dare_ you! It's not even their fault!" Marina and I wrestled her to the ground and sat on her and she was screaming like a banshee the whole time. "Kill them? I'll fucking rip your throat out! Rip your nuts off and shove them up your damn nose!" Even with us placed firmly on top of her, she _still_ somehow managed to throw another knife at him.

"Cris!" I snapped at her. "Stop it!"

Marina looked flatley at arrogant ass as he just calmly waved a hand to make the knives vanish before they even hit. Oh great... Magical menacing munchnuggets... "That right there should prove our devotion to them well enough. Good job on pissing her off genius." Caitlin was watching it all with scared eyes as she stood nearby, looking like she was about to cry.

"You females should be happy I don't just kill the nuisance myself." He snarled back. "I will make a deal with you."

Jessica placed herself between them and us. "Dad I swear to fucking god. Leave them alone! We'll handle this ourselves!"

"I think that is for them to decide." Dad replied. Then those eyes wandred over to us again. "I do not care for you, and I do not care for your mates. But our daughters have more pressing matters than to deal than other gods' affairs."

"Mother fuckers be in denial." Marada muttered as she crossed her arms. "I ain't doing Jack shit. Especially for them." That was meet with a round of agreeing nods from the rest of them, especially Jessica and Bre.

"I fucking hate you guys so much." Jessica growled with a look of death again. "And for the record? You don't care about anyone! You haven't even seen your fucking grandson! Pack sand!"

He looked at her, his face softening ever so slightly. Or maybe it was just wishful thinking on my part. I wasn't holding him up in the high regards department by this point. "Grandson?"

"Some fucking gods," Jessica muttered to him "wouldn't let you within a 100 mile radius of him anyway. Vicky. You guys have options. Don't accept anything. We'll figure everything out."

Cris snorted at the male group as we let her back up onto her feet. "I dare you to even try that stunt. Looks like an egotistical godling is very sure of himself. Where's the fucking door to this place? If he mentions killing the guys one more time imma strangle him."

My eyes had locked onto macho man by then, my own anger coming to the surface. "I don't think I give a rat's ass about you either. Seem more interested in trying to get into a pissing contest with..." I blinked as what had been said finally dawned on me. Hey, I had my slow moments too. "Wait...did you say daughters?" I looked at Marina. "Did he say daughters?" You had to be kidding me...

Marina just nodded.

I facepalmed. "Oh boy..." I gave Jessica a very long, flat look. "You couldn't tell us this before hand why?"

"Does it matter?" Marina answered instead, her eyes narrowing. "But I'm starting to agree with Cris. They throw another threat like that around I'll help her hold him and give her my knife so she can proceed with ball removal."

Jessica didn't look to happy that we made the connection. "That's why we never told you. They are total ass holes, plus the subject never really came up. And on top of everything, only a handful of people know what we are, and we try to keep that. Plus we didn't think we'd be working with you too much..."

Caitlin flinched violently at that as she eyeballed the men. "Guys...do you really need to be pushing our luck here?"

"They started it." Cris mumbled.

"How old are you? Two?"

Cris flipped her off.

I refused to be intimidated by them. My arms crossed and a brow came up. "Excuse us for not properly cowering in fear in front of you. You're not our first exposure to the supposedly mighty and all wise immortals. And you are about as stuck up as some others I've met. Now...would you mind showing us the door? We have husbands to find since you take forever to get to the damn point."

He snorted at me. Lord, I was really wanting to shove my asp up his nose by this point along with his balls. "You wish to feel your mate with a bond he is too powerful to expose you to with his dragon form."

Cris opened her mouth to say somethng. More than likely a smartass comment.

"His 'totem spirit' as they call them." One of the others spoke up before she could. "We can give you that ability to withstand that power easily, and get through to him."

"But by all means." Asshole number one pointed. "The door is right there. However, I don't think your children would take too kindly to letting a sure chance slip through your fingers. Just my opinion."

"Get out of their heads!" Bre snapped. "Stop twisting everything!"

Cris mouth closed right back up again and we all looked at each other. With that one phrase they had our immediate attention. But we didn't like it. My jaw was clenching tightly as Marnia snarled at them. Cait took what they were saying in with confusion until it dawned on her, then she blinked.

I turned my gaze from the others and glared back at him. "What's the fucking catch? I know your type well enough to know there is going to be a damn catch."

He put his hands up innocently. Innocent my ass... "No catch."

Jessica wasn't buying it. She glared her father down before spinning me around to face her. "Pain. Lots. And lots. Of pain. I'm talking bones breaking and reforming, skin stretching, everything ripping and tearing. It'll be an agony unlike anything you've ever felt. And on top of that. They can ask favors of you. Whenever. You're bound to them like the turtles are bound to their gods. You don't have to do this. We'll figure something out."

Asshole number two spoke up, sounding a bit smug. "Well if that's the case. I'd hurry and think of something. Chaos crystal isn't good for them last I checked.

"Shut the fuck up!" Megan, the calm, collected, cold one, might I remind you, snapped at him, her eyes and hands glow angrily. I had a strong feeling that one was her sperm donor. "No one asked you to speak!"

My jaw was clenching hard enough to where I was scared that I was going to break some teeth. Caitlin was terrified. She was beginning to tremble.

"Good god..." Cris stared at them "what are they going to do? Turn us into dragons or something?"

"I'd like to know myself." Marina said as her arms crossed.

By that point I had regained my composure...somewhat. "I don't care about the pain, I'll gladly go through that and more if it gives me a chance. But I won't go into this blind. What exactly are you wanting to do? What can you possibly give me when Amaterasu already gave the most powerful spirits she has to the guys?" I narrowed my eyes at him, clearly letting him know I wasn't afraid of him. "Spirits even other gods are hesitant to tangle with i might add. I'd be extremely careful of trying to ask for anything from us, because there might be a god ass BBQ going on up in here." See? I could throw out veiled threats too.

He smirked at me. The motherfucker was smirking at me! Gah! I so wanted to punch that look off of his face... "You won't be tied down to spirits. We have been blessing mortals since the beginning of our time, we have perfected it far longer than those Japanese gods. Because we know you humans can be good servants. We know how to make you dangerous without limits, yet keep you on a leash. We can offer you rank, a power stronger than the one you will face."

Jessica rolled her eyes. "Speaking in fucking riddles. He will turn you into something called a wing saber. They were our version of angels, and they actually had ranks amongst gods. In fact, Amauro, or Unicron as you knew him, would send these wing sabers to _kill_ gods. They were eventually used to torture people, after I took Unicron's place and rank, I got rid of them. They were a symbol of pure evil. You will hold the power of low ranking gods, maybe a couple ranks below my cousins. And you won't have an entity to corrupt or attempt to control you. You'll have something called a core, which just produces energy as you need it, that will be your spirit/entity equivalent."

"I remember when wing sabers were nice and did anything for the Elemental race." Maranda gave the men a happy "go fuck yourself" look. "Kind of like you guys did. Then you went into dick mode and I would rather eat gum off of the new york streets that were full of needles than talk to you now." She smiled brightly.

Asshole dad ignored her as he looked at me. "I am not here to convince you mortal. Take it or leave it, it makes no difference to me. All it takes is time, but I have all the time in the world. Your mates? Well not so mu-" I blinked as he got nailed in the chest with some kind of energy blast that came from Jessica. Even as I turned towards her, the black glow faded from her eyes.

"Shut the fuck up! Piece of shit..."

He turned on the lightshow himself, his eyes glowing a gold color. Great...I was about to be caught up in the middle of a god smack down...

Jessica didn't back down as her arms crossed and she glared at him. "You've pissed me off for the last time. Hold your fucking tongue. Fuck."

I was rubbing my face in aggravated frustration, then I sighed and looked at the walking lightbulb. "Your definition of power and mine vary. You see it as tying them down, but those spirits are just as noble as the turtles they are bound to. That alone makes them more powerful than I'll ever be. But it seems you'll never understand the reasoning on why." I smiled sweetly at him. "And you keep thinking you'll have us on a leash. Whatever helps you sleep at night." This fucker obviously didn't know what he was getting himself in to. I mean...has even even _met_ this family?

"And we don't care about no damn rank." Cris added. "We just want the guys back."

"Because we love them." Marina quietly told them. "But I'm thinking that's something you also don't understand."

I turned and looked at the others, asking them the question with my eyes. I wouldn't force them into this. I already knew I was going to do this if it gave me a chance to reach Leo. I couldn't make the decision for them however. One by one a slow nod met my asking look, even terrified Caitlin gave her agreement with that quiet gesture.

"You sure Cait? We saw what the guys went through with their change, this is going to be just as bad if not worse."

She was shaking, but she just nodded again.

I closed my eyes with a heavy sigh, then opened them to face the god. My expression firmly set now that I had an option placed in front of me. My voice didn't waver. "Do it."


	11. Chapter 11

Jessica looked worried, very worried. She grabbed my arm and pulled me close to her in a last ditch attempt to talk me out of it. "Vicky, you're going to be giving yourself into servitude. Are you sure you want to do this?" She looked pleadingly at the others. "Pain and servitude. One more time. Are you guys ready for that?"

She would have better luck in trying to convince a brick wall that it needed to fall over.

"Stand before me mortals."

I rolled my eyes at the commanding tone before giving Jessica a reassuring smile and a quick, sly, wink. "Trust me. I know _exactly_ what I just got myself into. I'm not so sure _he_ knows what he is getting himself into though."

Megan suddenly went to her comm link, her expression was blank as usual, as she calmly listened.

Maranda mumbled to herself: "Only good thing about this place is the amazing cell reception."

Carrie eyed her "Yeah, but then bonds don't work, riddle me that bull shit"

Maranda shrugged and looked at her water cousin, then clicked to her in their native tongue.

Megan just merely shrugged, still focusing, then it hit her. "Teens left their base in a hurry, someone got a hold of Lindsey, order Supereon?"

"You four track them down. Starblast and I will meet up with you." Jessica stated.

"Yes Supereon. let's move!" Megan definitely had a change in her step as she took on a more of a leader tone, and led her cousins through the godly gate of the heaven, they zapped out in a spontaneous order.

Hearing that made me a bit nervous, but more than anything it also resolved our determination to do this. because now we had too to stop the slaughter that would take place if these asshats didn't keep their promise. They better keep them...I'll kick their teeth in, or die myself trying.

.

.

Jessica and Bre watched the gods intently around their new friends, they could throw them farther than they trusted them. Photo's hands lit up several different colors, and then slowly started to disperse, getting close to the women, they were about to change. But it was put to a pause as Jessica angrily stopped it "Hold the fuck up. No opposing elements."

"That will make them more efficient." Her father urged as his fellow gods started to walk up to the women to turn them.

" _NO. OPPOSING. FUCKING. ELEMENTS. DICK._ " Jessica all but snarled, the amount of fucks she gave was in the negative and the amount of shit she was going to take from them and that her friends were going to take from them was right down there with it.

Hydro confronted Vicky, Pyro confronted Cris with a sneer, that she sent right back at him. Aero calmly confronted Cait while Geo watched Marina as he confronted her with a disgusted yet emotionless look. Marina just coolly watched him back. ''You don't have to fucking like me, just do what you need to do so we can go.''

Starblast and Starstriker kept a solid eye on the scene, they really didn't want the women to go through with this, but they were hell bent on helping their mates and the Elementals had to respect that, because they were showing signs of being Elemental when they didn't even have the DNA yet. As far as the two were concerned, these women were more than ready to tackle something like this. The energies moved from the gods' entity and shot into the ladies.

.

.

The pain...oh my god the pain. I can't describe it to you. All I can tell you was that it felt like a blanket of agony had been wrapped around me and was suffocating me. Nothing I had ever gone through before hurt like this. Not Bishop, not my meetings with Leo's once dark counterpart, not shockwave. Nothing. If I screamed out in pain, I can't tell you that either. What I do know is that it felt like someone was tearing me apart from the inside out. Then I had the odd sensation of drowning. As if I was surrounded by water before it felt like it invaded my body. My body took it in, and added to the pain I was already feeling.

I had just enough awareness to notice I was on my stomach on the ground. The others were writhing in pain around me, but the one that broke my heart to see in pain the most was Caitlin. Her tears were flowing down her pain filled face, and she was scared, god she looked so scared. My arm tried to reach out to her as I tried to crawl over towards her, wanting so much to give her some kind of comfort. I never made it as felt something rip out of my back before I gave in and let the pain drive me into oblivion.

And even there I had no peace, the pain followed me. Then a calming, soothing sensation of floating in warm water filled me and acted as a dampener to the invasive feeling. Wrapped in that warm cocoon, I slipped deeper into the darkness.

.

.

Lavi skidded to a stop as soon as she crossed the ground bridge. She wasn't quite sure what she had been expecting, but finding herself on a very, very large ship in the middle of a shitload of water really wasn't it. She should have expected her twin to follow her and tackle her though, but her shock clearly caught her off guard and they both went rolling across the deck. She knew right away he was furious. "Dammit Lavi!" He snapped. "Now is not the time to start acting like Mom!"

Lavi just sneered at him, tired of his continued efforts to keep her from helping their Father. "Get off!" She accompanied that outburst with a well placed kick to his gut that succeeded in doing just that as he tipped over backwards.

Before her angry twin could come in again, a hand was slapped over both of their mouths before they were yanked behind some crates and out of sight. Dante was giving the squabbling pair a firm, disappointed look as he released his hands from their now quiet flaptraps.

Thane was there too, looking around in his own disapproval. "Are we on a damn boat? Why are we on a boat? I hate boats." He crossed his arms with a harumph as he glared around.

Dante's eyes rolled under that yellow mask before he yanked Thane down too. "Shh!"

Ari was just looking at them with amusement as she shook her head.

This is when Maranda decided to pop up between Thane and Dante. She gave a dramatically fake determined and dark look as she kept her attention forward, looking like a cowboy ready to tackle a giant war in an old western film. "So. What's the plan minions?"

Thane jumped about three feet in the air before he spun angrily to start throwing curses at Maranda before Dante slapped his hand over Thane's mouth. "Do. Not. This is _not_ the place to be showing everyone your temper!"

Ari was trying not to laugh by this point.

Maranda's cousin Megan popped up behind her, pulling her away, with a firm look, she calmly excavated the area, her eyes were narrowed with legit concentration, unlike her cousin. "This is Tidal wave"

"Ah, fun fun. Dragons, Steves, Bishop, Bishop minions and now a giant Decepticon to fight. Might be even fight for once." she shrugged with a: "fuck, I'm game" kind of expression. She was hushed by the water pusher, they needed to stay quiet god damn it!

Carrie popped up and went low, then got a small device out of her camel back, placing it on her her wrist, and began to fiddle with it until is started to work. "Ready to get this show on the road? It's been a long freaking time since I've been here, anyone remember where cons kept prisoners on Tidal wave?"

"Uh yes. Follow." the dishwater blonde hot head stood, sounding far too chipper.

"Inferna, this so isn't the place to be pulling out snacks." Megan gave her cousin a flat look as she watched her take some goldfish out of a baggy, after the statement from the temporary group leader, put it back with a pout before returning in her duty on leading the way.

Ty was giving his sister the look of death now. He was fuming internally that she pulled this stunt. "This is also not the place for-"

"Oh...shut up!" Lavi snapped viciously at him as she moved onward. That outburst even took her cousins by surprise. Lavi had her rash moments, just like the rest of her family, but this was way beyond rash now. It was now a single minded purpose to find her sire, and she was throwing all caution to the wind. And she had the most to lose.

"Lavi!" Ty hissed at her in a hoarse whisper, his own frustration and worry getting to him.

She wasn't helping when she didn't even slow, but she did take a moment to flip her brother off. "I'm going to find my father!"

Ari watched with her lips pursed in thought at the older turtle girl. "She is so taking after Aunt Vic right now..."

Ty fixed his glare on her next.

"And you're Uncle Leo." Ari grinned at him.

Thane rolled his eyes, then gave both a decent push to get them moving. "Just go! Before we lose sight of her!"

Maranda stopped, and ever so casually, not to mention very quickly, knocked out a guard without anything so much of a peep out of him, she pried open a shipping crate, threw him in as if he was just dirty laundry, then kept moving, leading the way, humming lightly. "Got that one song by Alice in chains stuck in my head. Good song."

"You are too fucking cheerful." Thane grumbled at Maranda, his patience obviously starting to wear thin...what little of it he had.

"And you aren't cheerful enough." Ari deadpanned back, a small smile on her face as she watched her aggravated cousin. Gleefully taking pleasure in his annoyance.

That earned her a glare from him. Lots of males glaring going on today it seemed. "Maybe I would be if my dad hadn't been hijacked and turned into the local destruction crew. You may not care about your dad, but I care about mine."

That actually made Ari stop a moment, her face now sad and hurt as she said quietly. "Of course I care about him...but that doesn't mean he would want us all to worry like we have been. Especially not Lavi."

The lavender banded teen just clenched her jaw and kept moving. Refusing to be dissuaded from her task. The NEST girls even stopped for a moment to look at him disapprovingly.

"I don't know if it's just a theory, but I'm going to say your main mode is: 'Stick in the mud mode' mini minion." Maranda muttered to him.

Bailey walked alongside Thane and Ari. "If you aren't using your worry as ass biting motivation, and merely using it to be scared and nervous, or irritated, you're using that emotion incorrectly. Ari is right, they wouldn't want you to worry, hell, they probably wouldn't want you to even go after them. So save them the emotion since you are family and will be going after them anyway."

"Yeah, they already don't want you to come get them, do at least one thing they wanted from you, because coming for them is out of the question" Clayshah added, still focused on the contraption on her wrist as she walked.

"I think I remember where you're going, there's a door right here" Megan moved a crate over and there, right there, a trap door. This is why the fire and water girls were leading, not because of leadership skills alone, or even fighting skills, but because these mofos had the best sense of direction and remembered shit like this. The blue eyed blonde pulled open the wooden door and led the way in, followed by Maranda, who just grabbed the sides of the ladder and slid down in mere seconds.

Carrie and Bailey followed to ensure the coast was clear, they knew the teens were fully capable but secretly, they were all worried about Lavi, girl was pregnant after all. They fanned out in a big hallway, Maranda kept going, leading the way

The teens followed, Ty still glaring at Lavi and she was still ignoring him.

"Cuz, you might as well just give it up." Dante mumbled to Lavi's brother quietly. "It's too late to send her back now anyway."

Ty finally gave in, rubbing his face in frustration as he did. "Yeah...I know." A quiet sigh filled the air as he let his anger go. It wouldn't do any good here anyway. Lavi wasn't going to stop until she found their father.

Megan fell back a little, letting Inferna continue to lead as she took a right down the hall and kept running. Megan lightly tapped Ty's arm to get his attention, she looked at Lavi who was further up ahead, trailing her cousin. "We'll keep her safe. Promise." Yes the Hydro knew it didn't look or sound sincere with her constant emotionless expression and broken voice, but she promised it, and she was hell bent on keeping her promise, especially when babies were involved.

"Ok, here is the hallway for prisoners, and I feel as though that door is the one we need to get through..." She popped another goldfish cracker into her mouth. "Uh, yeah, large ass metal door that had about 6 or 7 vehicons surrounding it? At the very minimum that was a safe place to start searching, just a hunch though. I have an idear, everyone get up high, this will solve a few problems." And there she goes again with that scary, devilish gleam in her eye as she rubbed her hands together gleefully.

Thane raised a ridge at her way too happy expression. "Oh lord...what did we get ourselves into..."

"A big mess?" Dante replied before the teens all did what was asked of them and climbed the walls to hide in the rafters.

Maranda whistled a tune, running near the Steves, planting several bombs strategically, before scaling her way up a wall up to sit next to the teens, nodding at Dante. "Sup." She sat on a support beam with her feet dangling off of the edge, goes to her wrist where a watch looking object was, then hit a button. All the Steves but one blew the hell up, the very last one blew up, but it was different, more controlled somehow, his body flew towards a wall where another bomb went off, shooting him to another wall where another bomb sat ready, and then that one shot him off towards the ground, where yet another one shot him off into the cell door, that guy offlined twice somehow it was such an overkill.

"How many freaking bombs do you have!" Carrie was laughing really hard with Maranda.

"Too many, apparently." Megan looked more irritated than anything. But she was used to her crazy pyromancer cousin

The boys just stared at her like she was fucking crazy. They probably weren't too far off the mark either. Ari was the only one who thought it was hilariously funny as her laughter echoed out in the corridor. She was laughing so hard she almost slipped off the beam she was sitting on.

Maranda got down to the ground, stepping into the cell, laughing her ass off at the popcorn Steve. "Eat your heart out Wheeljack! Those were strategic explosions! Oh hey, turtles." She looked a little agitated at what she saw, but the emotion was quickly covered up. Not only were they chained by their wrists to the walls, but chains also crisscrossed all over their bodies, arms and legs. Every section of their bodies had a chain holding them against the wall. But what had to be the most undignified thing was the damn collars around their necks. "Oof, really badly chained up turtles." Maranda winced and walked in.

"Speaking of Wheeljack, I am going to be testing out one of his inventions since he isn't on the field. Some weird GPS to make things easier on the field for noobies when they run for their life" Carrie announced after she got down from the support beam to look at the turtles.

"They have been exposed to those chaos crystal collars for too long. we need to break them free." Yeah, NEST girls have been there done that, just different time and place.

"Do you think they could wait until Vicky gets here with the other ladies?" Bailey asked hopefully. It would be much more simple for them to pop up and use the new bond to get through to them when they were weakened physically and mentally from the chaos crystal, but at the same time, she knew how that shit felt, and if they didn't get them away from it quickly, it wouldn't be good for them.

Megan shook her head. "There are bound to be enemies on the way, between Bishop goons, cons, and Tidal wave, we need to move now." Megan knew what a transformation was like. Not the same exact one the ladies were going through, hers hurt more since she had rank in the gods. But they wouldn't have time to go through the transformation _and_ recover enough to get to their feet and get their mind working in time for them to get the turtles.

"So we set them free" Maranda decided.

Lavi didn't take what she was seeing to well. She looked them all over, tears flowing down her face as they hung limp in their confinement. Again she slapped Ty's hand away before she ran into the room to Leo. "Daddy!" Her hand reached out to lift his head gently, and it moved limp under her hand. His eyes didn't even open.

Lavi wiped her tears away and began to try and unhook him. "Daddy, it's ok. We're here. We are going to take you home. I can't get these damn things open!" She jerked on the chains in frustration, tears trying to slide down her face again. And because of that she missed Leo's hand move ever so slightly towards her as if he was trying to reassure his daughter everything would be ok before it grew still again.

The rest of the worried children also began to move closer, eyeing the chains with anger.

"Guys, hold up." Carrie finished programming the GPS thingy, then gently nudged the turtle tots away from their fathers back towards the door. Which, despite the heart wrenching situation, was kind of funny. This was a 4'9 midget being motherly to turtle children about 2-3 times her size. "The second they are released they are going to regain enough strength to use their abilities again-" she urged.

In the background, Maranda confronted the turtles, pulling her sword out. As Carrie continued to ramble, Maranda's sword began to glow red to match her ability aura, she looked at the cuffs as if she was a golfer about to take a swing at a ball.

"So we will need to go about this very strategically-" Carrie proceed in rambling.

Maranda went into fruit ninja mode, slashing apart all the cuffs. Now not being held up by the restraints anymore, the bodies slumped to the floor.

"What we can do is-" Carrie immediately stopped her ramble, She just knew, not by the sounds or anything, it was more of a sixth sense that her idiot cousin just freaking did something. "Please tell me you didn't just release beings, that can turn into _very_ large dragons, while we are all in a very confined space, in the middle of the ocean."

Maranda walked back to the group. eating pork. Crap, if it wasn't explosive, or any other weapons, it was food in her bag. She slid her sword back into the sheath after she dispersed the energy, walking up to Carrie, then turned to look at the turtles/the work she did to the chains in such a short amount of time.

They were still lying almost motionless on the floor, until their eyes suddenly snapped open. And they were all glowing brightly but they still had that flat, distant look in them.

Ty took that all in with a single glance and knew exactly what was about to happen. "Oh no..."

Soon after the glow began to encompass their whole bodies.

Ty just gave up on trying to talk to Lavi and just resorted to dragging her out the damn door.

"Shit!" Thane exclaimed as the glow brightened, then he began to help Ty push Lavi out the damn door.

They had just cleared the frame when the first sounds of metal creaking and snapping filled the confined space, and there were parts of the ship starting to fall as the large dragon frames began to bend the ship frame around them.

Ari looked at Maranda before she said in a calm tone. "That might not have been the best idea." Then she turned and ran, following her cousins.

Maranda watched the changing turtles intently. "Shit." Her cousins watched her, surprised, for her to get uneasy was a very rare sight. "I forgot the poppy seeds for my pork. This saddens me." Ah, there was their dumb ass cousin. Carrie grabbed her arm and moved out the door with her.

"Just shut the fuck up and run..." Bailey and Megan followed the earth NEST girl and the already running teens out the door.


	12. Chapter 12

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!" Thane's voice was keeping step with his feet as he ran.

"Goose!" Ari chirped as she sped past her lumbering cousin.

Maranda causally ran with her NEST team. "Huh. You know? I've gotta admit, that recovery time is pretty damn impressive."

Carrie, on the other hand was calm about the situation, but the fact she has fought with Maranda for so long and she still pulled shit like this pissed her right the hell off! "This is why we don't take you anywhere!"

"I'm too awesome for you to handle."

"Move your asses!" Megan ordered with more irritation than anything

"Oh yeah..." …Leave it to Maranda to need to be reminded that they are getting chased by guards and 4 large elemental dragons.

"Why do we listen to your dumb ass?" Carrie calmly hollered over the loud claws and crashing behind them of the dragons scurrying on the hard floors, they were actually doing pretty well on the agility department. Maranda, she just looked way too gleeful and proud of herself, she knew exactly what she was doing.

"I know you pull shit like this on purpose." Bailey muttered.

"Chaos crystal is an equivalent of having red hot metal that is coated in acid hold you in place. We can't wait for Vicky and the others, they were suffering." She shrugged casually. She might be an asshole who loved to prank and blow shit up, but she knew what she was doing on the field.

The NEST girls ran up behind the teens. Carrie was doing some multitasking, keeping up while programming the GPS prototype on her wrist. "Alright, let's see how this thing does."

"At 2-hundred feet. Turn left." the choppy GPS announced. That command didn't settle well with the temporary leader of the group, her eyes narrowed.

"I thought we had one more hallway to go."

The GPS insisted it's directions were correct.

The earth pusher just shrugged, and led the way guiding the teens left. They keep running and stopped at the dead end that naturally had to be there. Carrie observed the predicament and looked down at the GPS in exasperation, waiting for further instructions to see if it could really help in getting them out of there.

"Recalculating. Make, a U-turn, turn-left and travel 100 feet." The damn computer corrected.

"Told you." the Hydro warrior sighed.

"You had one job you whore!" Carrie growled at the useless contraption.

Thane calmly reached out, took the GPS from Carrie, and threw it against the wall. It sparked a moment before what was left of it fell to the floor in a shower of useless parts.

"Feel better?" Ty asked his cousin.

"No." Thane flatly replied. "I'm about to be a dragon snack because of their dumbasses."

"Come on, let's circle around before they catch up-" Oh man, waaay too late for that, they turned just in time to see the blue of Leo's eyestripe, and he was quickly closing in with his dragon brothers.

"Ok, or not. Inferna, make an exit please." Megan rolled her eyes. Typical NEST girl luck and now her pyromaniac cousin got to blow more shit up.

"Awww yus!" Maranda grinned, she then started to throw some bombs on one of the walls, they stuck in place ready to make a very big boom.

By that point Leo was dangerously close, his jaws snapping shut mere feet from them. And the only reason he couldn't get to his snack was because his body was wedged in the narrow part of this side corridor.

Ty pulled his sister behind him as Leo's head thrashed, trying to get closer to them. Ty just looked up at those blank eyes. "Dad..."

For a moment, Leo seemed to hear him. The movements stopping and the growls quieting as he brought his head down. Ty and Lavi could clearly see the moisture building in his eyes as he looked at his children.

"Come on Dad. Don't... We want to take you home."

A single tear slipped down the large cheek as Leo let out a quiet rumble. Ty couldn't fight the urge to reach out, the pain and sorrow in those large eyes clearly telling him the turtle within wanted out. His hand had almost made contact with the large snout before Leo's eyes went flat and he suddenly lunged forward, his body pressing through the bottle neck. The sound of bending and tearing metal filling the air around them. Taken off guard by the sudden shift, Ty found himself backpedaling away from those now snapping jaws as Leo's head moved in for the kill. Ty had his sister pressed against the wall behind him, both twins cornered by their own father.

"Now would be good you crazy ass loon!" Thane yelled at Maranda in a strained voice.

"Calm yourself." Maranda rolled her eyes at the panicking Thane as she continued her work. Bailey quickly power blasted Leo with air, using the hallway to make a very powerful wind tunnel, throwing the dragon back down where he came, many, many feet away.

"Alright. That should do it" the Pyro causally threw up a shield to keep everyone safe from the blast that overtook the confined space. As water overwhelmed the boat, Megan went along with it to power blast Leo and his brothers, adding that with the wind blast. It was quite the overkill on them but the Elementals wanted to play it safe.

Megan shielded the youngling turtles and her cousins while Maranda took her time walking up to Thane before casually hooking her arms under Thane's and took off out of the freshly made exit. "In to the flood again! Same old trip it was baaack then!" Maranda was rocking the Alice in chains as she got high up in the sky. "So I made a big mistake!"

Carrie made her way above her hot headed cousin, Dante on her back. "Yes you did! Idiot!" Carrie laid a kick on her back and flew ahead of her.

"Knock it off you two." Megan sighed as she flew to the lead to the group, her powerful wings and godly strength made carrying Lavi and Ty easy while still staying agile and fast a breeze.

"Yeah you guys need to chill" Bailey called to them while firmly keeping Ari on her own back. The girls didn't know why they snatched up the turtle's child/ren of the turtle of their element, they just felt a weird motherly instinct to them for some reason or another. And considering that emotion was so rare to them, like, super rare, they just decided to give in to it, what harm would come from them keeping the younglings safe? Negative harm, that's what.

Raph and Mikey burst out of the ship on both sides of the hole as Leo and Donnie came out of the one Maranda made. They were also not happy dragons. That was evident by they way they started spitting dragon fire at the Elementals.

"Shit!" Thane pulled his legs out of the way of a blast, glaring at Maranda as he did. "Remind me to hit you with a big damn stick when this is all over with!"

Fire struck one of Maranda's wings as she looked at Thane, then snorted, the dragon fire not fazing her in the slightest. "Wouldn't be the first time I had the shit kicked out of me for having sympathy and mercy for some beings, I have come to peace with the fact it wouldn't be the last, have at it. Later, for now? Hold the fuck on." She swung the large hot headed turtle son around to her back, a red aura encircling him to protect him from any other fire blasts.

"I sure as hell ain't going to let go!" Thane assured as Maranda then went into a very, very fast dive, getting mere inches from the water, then zooms along it, quickly climbing again.

Megan continued her flying, trusting that Ty would keep a firm hold around her neck with his arms so she could maneuver and keep Lavi in a protective hold. But still did what she could to make sure Ty had enough leverage. Unfortunately, that did slow her down a little.

Maranda quickly jumped Leo, landing on his back, stomping points in his back near the base of his wings causing the wings to spaz out and for him to lose complete control of them for several moments. The blue trimmed dragon began to descend. She quickly got away from him and hightailed it to Megan. "We need to land, the teens can't help us much from up here, and they are in more danger in the open air."

"I was just trying to find land, we are in the middle of the ocean!" Megan reminded her.

Carrie sucker kicked Mikey right in the side sending him crashing towards the water. "Follow me! And quick!" Probably would have been best to originally let the girl of earth lead them to shore. Anyway, she took off, leading the way.

Maranda continued her flying above Aquarius. "And for the record Ty, we all have lots, and lots and lots of experience in dragon wrangling, never got around to telling you that."

Ty just rolled his eyes at the severely delayed response.

Donnie and Raph began to close in as the other two dragons floundered and caught themselves again.

"Faster!" Ari hollered as the large beasts closed in again. "Must go faster!"

"Jurassic park?" Thane growled incredulously. "Really? Of all the movies you could have picked..."

Ty took one look at the approaching dragons and swung himself up and onto Megan's back, ignoring her questioning expression. "Don't worry about me! Just make sure you hold Lavi!" Without offering any further explanation, he dug his foot a bit in her gear and actually stood up. His eyes now firmly fixed on his uncles. "Man... Uncle Raph...I really hope you don't remember this..." He reached into his pouch and pulled out two curious looking devices, pulled the plug on them and threw them. His aim was true and one hit each dragon in the face and green fumes exploded from the grenade like devices. Raph and Donnie stopped the chase, now more worried about clearing out their sinuses as they began to sneeze violently and gave out coughing, choking sounds. "Go!" Ty thundered to their rides. "While they are distracted!"

Maranda smoothly snagged Ty off of Megan's back and Megs really started to haul ass, Maranda following her, the two spotted shore and rapidly closed in on it before they landed with much haste, leaving long skidding trails in the loose sand. Bailey was the next to land, setting Ari down.

"Lavi, go find cover. We'll hold them off until your mothers can get here." Megan ordered, watching the dragons close in calmly, and also keeping an eye out for the enemy. Lavi did not approve of that order, based on the "fuck you bitch I ain't hiding" look she received out of the corner of her eye. So she was relying on someone to help her out on that, simply put. She lost hope in that when Ty snorted. He knew she wasn't going to budge.

Maranda set the boys down and walked around, looking up towards the sky expectantly, and noted in passing that the sand made things a little difficult in her steel toed boots. Carrie set Dante down, distracted from her task in watching the ones they were helping, she watched the sky "Here little dragons..."

Ari was also looking up, her eyes searching the clouds above them. "Come on...where are you..."

That question was answered when Mikey suddenly broke through a low cloud, dive bombing right for them.

"Scatter!" Ty gave the order, and his team immediately did just that as the dragon crashed face first in the ground where they had been standing moments before. He stood back up, his head shaking to clear the large amounts of sand out of his various facial openings, then tried to spit it all out of his mouth.

Ari let out a giggle at the less than graceful entrance. "Still need to work on your landing Daddy!"

Mikey blinked a little, amusement clear on his features for a moment, before his eyes went flat and he swung his head around towards his daughter. Ari easily backflipped out of the way of those sharp teeth. "Again? Do we gotta do this again?"

The second he snapped out of it, Bailey snuck up behind him, right after he snapped at the young turtle, she literally drop kicks Mikey in the ass so he did another faceplant in the sand. "Ok we're even now!" The air girl took on a lighter mood than she usually did. Sure she was sympathetic and had one of the more gentle hearts of the Elementals, but that doesn't change what she has seen, done and changed. But those thoughts escaped her mind this time, she had a big 'ol grin on her face as she took a ready fighter pose. She was going to have fun yes, but she certainly wasn't going to underestimate her current opponent. And for good reason, Mikey flipped back over before he rolling to his feet, his angry roar letting her know she really didn't do anything but piss him off.

Bailey was fully ware she didn't do any damage to him she gave him a scolding look and smacked his snout. "You stop it! That's a bad turtle dragon"

"...huh, so Ariel has gone suicidal." Maranda noted.

Raph came in with more control, but was roaring when he hit the ground on all fours. Leo and Donnie followed not far behind, Donnie immediately started snapping at a wildly dodging Thane while Leo looked everything over with a low growl, his eyes cautious as they narrowed. Even in this state he was analyzing everything.

"Go hide somewhere already!" Ty almost screamed at Lavi.

"No!" She screamed right back.

"If something happens to you he will never forgive himself!"

Lavi opened her mouth to say something, but was cut off when Dante tackled her out of the way of Raph's snapping jaws. "He's got a point Lavi!"

Megan eyed the skies, knowing there will be cons trying to follow. Then her eyes spotted the incoming boats full of Bishop's men. Her eyes narrowed and a hand raised, creating a massive wave that just crushed them. A few turtle tot eyes blinked at that.

Maranda grabbed Raph's tail as he snapped at Lavi and Dante, pulls hard enough to yank him back away from the two, and to where she could now reach his chest, she punched him in the specific spot on his chest making his front legs give out, she stared at the scene of his faceplant, for several seconds, then her mouth gaped as she remembered something.

"Oh no way. That's what Aqua meant..."

Her distraction cost her though when Raph's tail connected with her side and gave her a good whack.

Maranda gave a grunt in return as she hit the ground hard, and glared a hole into him. "Uh, ow."

Carrie urged the sand to grab Donnie's feet and trip him, keeping an eye on the skies too. Donnie was having none of it as he ripped his feet free, then went right back after Thane who was trying to get out of his way. Carrie gave him a flat look.

"Stupid sand!" Thane grumbled as he tried to run. "Can't run in stupid sand!"

Ari seemed to float by him as she ran. "I'm not having a problem. Maybe your big backside just isn't made for sand maneuvers?"

Dante had managed to get Lavi to her feet and drag the reluctant girl to the treeline only to come running right back out, right into his blue banded uncle. "Oh...crap... Hi Uncle Leo..." The answer he got was a growl and a nice breath of fire.

Dante scrambled away, just a hooping and whoopin away as he complained about his predicament. "Hot, hot, hot, hot!"

"Yeah," Thane rolled his eyes sarcastically "we figured that out last time. Does anyone have anything resembling a plan here!" The question came even as he did a forward somersault over Mikey's snout.

"Keep them busy!" Ty answered. "And where the fuck is Mom? We need her!"

"Like she could do much last time!" Thane threw a rock in frustration, hitting Raph on the snout. That earned him his Father's undivided attention as the big head turned towards him. "I'm getting real tired of this Dad!"

Raph tilted his head a bit, seeming to listen to his son, then roared at him.

"Oh yeah...that helped!" Ari was now the one rolling her eyes.

Ty was fighting his own frustration by this point. "But she's got a better chance of getting to him...than we do? Dad?"

Megan turned her attention to Leo, giving a deep exhale, pulling her sword, and confronted him from an angel, watching him intently with her ice blue eyes. In return, Leo had stopped his attacks and was once again staring at Megan intently, his head slightly tilted. His tail was lashing back and forth like an agitated cat's, but he also seeming hesitant to press his attack. Leo's head shifted slightly as Ty walked over to join Megan, his eyes now locked onto his Father's. "Easy Father..."

Lavi joined them, much to Ty's frustration. "Dad..."

Silence was their answer as he watched them, his tail still lashing.

"Come on..." Lavi said quietly, hoping he would snap out of it.

The plea went unheard as Leo growled and charged, sending all three of them scrambling again.

"Air strike!" Megan watched the Steves charge up and start to close in, she held up a hand to blast Leo in the chest to get distance, then ran towards Dante and Lavi, following the Steves and also running from the explosives, then quickly shoved Lavi and Ty into the treeline, not making it away in time and one of the missiles landed right between her feet, blasting shrapnel into her chest, and sending her flying back with an umph and grunt. A shudder ran through her body as the distinct burning of chaos crystal began to do a number on her and she spit up some blood with an ass load of irritation.

Maranda dodged a Raph snap and kicked him in the side, clearing him into the woods, before she herself dove out of the way, wings spread, as the air strike commenced, they were on the other side of the beach, so they didn't get the early end.

Carrie grabbed Donnie's tail, and swung him around and into the water, then ran at Thane and Ari, tackling them and using her wings as cover from any debris, before getting back up after the Steves headed out to circle back around

"Fucking Steves, more annoying than that piece of shit GPS.." Maranda huffed

Bailey snagged, Dante giving cover to him too. "Well, this is going well. Come the fuck on Striker! You guys need to hurry!"

.

.

Jessica and Bre watched their friends warily as they laid there. The worry clear on their faces as they took in the bodies. What had just happened was something that took a toll on these humans. A large one. And they were not happy about the fact that these poor girls had been manipulated into doing this. They exchanged hate filled glares with the gods that did it even as they stood guard over the prone forms.

It was during one of those exchanges that a soft glow began to illuminate the turtle mates. Very slight and gone unnoticed by the members of the staring contest.

Marina was the first to move, her new extensions twitching slightly as a muffled groan came from her. Caitlin was the next one to make it known she had woken up, by the soft sounds of her crying. The pain remembered and still felt as her body readjusted. Cris forced herself up to her feet, a pain filled snarl on her face, her mouth spitting out curses as she looked over to Vicky. Then she ever so kindly gave the last woman a kick. "Wake up!"

Vicky also let out a groan as she sat up. Everything hurt. And she was tired, so very tired. And why did her back feel like she was carrying something heavy? "Why do I feel like I shouldn't be up yet?" She asked in a very weary tone.

"Why do I feel Like I shouldn't even be alive?" Cris asked back, struggling to keep her balance that suddenly seemed to be off.

It took all four of them a moment longer to figure out why they felt like shit and off balance, their eyes wide as they stared at the large, bloody wings coming out of each other's backs. Words failed all of them as they stared, mouths gaping open in their shock.

"And that'd be why. You guys good at learning fast?" Jessica was impressed, when her and her cousins went through their transformations, it took them days to wake up, was it because Vicky and the rest of them didn't have as much of severe transformation as her and her cousins?

"I'll help them Supereon. Go make sure Aqua's stubborn ass doesn't keep fighting. I could feel that one from here." Bre huffed, she could feel her cousin's injuries through their family bond, and they were not some scrapes and bruises either.  
Hydro, the water god, raised a brow, looking like he might question what she meant but his expression went emotionless again.  
"Got it, see you down there." Jess zapped out.

The turtle mates were still struggling to take it all in as they began to pick themselves up off of the ground. Cait was having a particularly hard time as she fell backwards on her bottom again. Marina stepped over to offer her a hand up although she wasn't looking to steady on her feet either.

"If we have too." Vicky forced the reply out of her shocked body.

"And if we don't learn we bumble our way through shit." Cris added. "Works just as good."

Vicky was already looking around, her eyes narrowed as she began to piece together a few things. Years of training and learning under Leo clearly showing as she quickly adjusted to the current situation. "I have a feeling we don't have that luxury to take our time. Where are the others?"

Cris' eyes also narrowed as she caught onto the implied implication of that question. "They went after the dragons again, didn't they? Somebody better do that fancy teleport shit and get us there right fucking now!" A ring of fire exploded around her as her temper flared and she stopped her outburst, her eyes growing wide once again. "Did I just do that?"

Caitlin was looking at Cris with awe, her tear stained eyes wide. If this kept up, somebody's eyeballs were going to pop out of their sockets.

Before anything else could be said over the matter, a bright flash of light engulfed the newly winged women and they suddenly found themselves in a thickly forested area. Once again they stumbled as they struggled to keep their bearings.

Cris slapped a hand to her mouth, suddenly looking very uneasy. "They really need to quit doing that. Imma going to puke..."

"You just said you wanted someone to do that." Marina reminded her.

"Shut up..."

Vicky just ignored them and fought down her own queasy feelings, now running towards the unmistakable sounds of dragons fighting, her companions were very quick to snap out of their stupor and follow.

Bre teleported next to the girls. She watched them all for a moment, did they all learn how to teleport or some shit? The fuck? She shook her head, there is no time to dwell on it.

"Okaaaaay. Striker is leading them away, she wants to get everyone out of the open and the Elementals are going to keep fighting out there while she gets the dragons to a secluded spot. It's too dangerous to stay out there, especially with how tired you guys will be."

Vicky just gave a terse nod, but kept running.

Behind them, standing in the branch of a sturdy tree, Amaterasu watched with a small smile of satisfaction on her face. There wasn't much she could do without harming her champions or the spirits bound to them, but the Elemental gods had just unknowingly solved that problem for her. She quietly faded out, secure in the bond these women shared with their mates.


	13. Chapter 13

Something had shifted. Ty noticed that right away as he rolled back to his feet. He watched his father warily, fully intending to start dodging and rolling again in an instant. Even as the other three dragons closed back in on the group trying to help them, those blue eyes looked up, his eyes locked onto the squadron of Cons as they circled around, tail twitching slightly at the tip in agitation. Then, with a thunderous roar, Leo unleashed a massive blast of dragonfire at the seekers as they closed in again.

The formation they had been flying in broke rapidly as they broke apart to scramble out of the way of the dragon fire that suddenly wasn't on their side. For the moment anyway.

"Leonardo!"

Ty whipped his head around, his eyes narrowing as he tried to find the owner. He knew that voice, it was the one who had taunted his Mother the last time they had tried to bring the elder turtles back around. His lip twisted into a snarl. "Bishop..."

"Stop attacking those drones and focus on the targets I've already specified! Attack these interlopers!"

Leo was trembling violently as he fought against that command, but ultimately lost as once again his head turned towards the turtles and elementals around him.

"Dammit!" Ty hissed quietly as he once again lost the advantage to try and snap his father out of it.

"You know...I am really, really, really starting to hate that guy. Bad dude whose name I can't fucking remember!" Maranda called to Bishop. "You will be a grease stain on the pavement, if not by me, then by one of my cousins! Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow! But it is a promise!" she continued with a huff, then dodged out of the way of a dragon attack. Bailey stepped in for her as the Pyro girl ran to her cousin to make sure the water pusher was ok.

Megan wasn't looking too good as she struggled to sit up, her shrapnel impaled body shaking with the effort. "God damn it..." She growled out before her glare snapped up to the Steves as they came back in again. "Fucking pieces of shit." Yeah she looked done. Megan gently pulled her bloodied hand away from her side, looking at the injuries. That wasn't going to be healing any time soon, stupid chaos crystal missiles.

Maranda landed lightly next to her cousin. "Hey Aqua. You uh, having a good time on the ground? Yeah? Having a fun time playing hero? Yeah? Gonna beat up the Steves now? Huh? Yeah? Gonna-"

"I will punch you in the god damn face!" The Hydro snapped back.

Maranda snickered at the tone, then checked over the damage to her relative "Hmm. Yup. That's an injury."

"Thank you, I thought is was a fucking rainbow tattoo. Cauterize me, and hurry, we have a lot more company coming."

"Okie" Maranda held a hand out, and without a second of hesitation quickly placed her hand directly on the blistering and heavily bleeding injuries.

Megan growled and at some points of time, yelled some not so nice words as the chaos crystal burned into her skin, the fire trapping it. Yes, probably not helping the pain in the slightest, at the same time though, it was stopping the bleeding, that's all that needed to be done for right now. The intensive burning and metal sliver can be dealt with later. Megan forced herself to take a few full inhales and exhales, then gave Leo a flat look upon realization that she got his attention.

"Shit." she huffed again. Ty was already hot on the blue banded dragon, but she needed to get up and prepared for a fight now.

"Welp. You got his attention. You did bad." Maranda sighed.

Megan sent a water blast at Leo getting a decent shot in on him, sending him to the ground. Then, much to her irritation, she watched as Tidalwave began his trek towards the shore. The Hydro wiped some sweat off of her pale and growing more pale face as she shot a very irritable expression that should have been able to blast a hole in the massive vessel.

"Man cuz, you do not look good." Maranda watched her cousin, taking on how sickly she looked. If she was honest, it was making her a little antsy and a little protective. She usually didn't get to the: "I will fucking skin a mother fucker if they breathe in her direction" mode until a little later. In the mean time, Megan went after the blue trimmed dragon, sword drawn in defense, she might be a little more slow, but she would still be efficient, and until she hit the ground exhausted, Maranda would help her fight.

"Meh, fuck it" she decided, for now she would be ok for a little longer, the Pyro has fought alongside her for long enough to know that. In the meantime Maranda turned her sights back on Raph, cracking her neck, and charged at the biggest of the turtle dragons.

The red banded dragon's reply to that was to bring a massive paw down ontop of her, full force. The stomp made the soft ground give way under her, and instead of squishing his target, who had her arms crossed over her head to try and ward off the blow, he slammed her into the sand, straight down, until only her head and arms were sticking out. Of course it didn't help Maranda's temper any when Thane was laughing, hard, from somewhere nearby.

"Thane, I hope Mikey sits on you! _And_ farts on you, you lil shit!" Maranda called to him, she made her wings erupt from her back, causing an explosion of sand, leaving a large hole where she was standing.

But hey, the fire girl got a few good hooks in on Raph, knocking him around in a bunch of directions, then finally her knee came up to meet him in the chest hard enough to knock the wind out of the red trimmed dragon. A little hard to breathe fire in that condition.

Raph shook the hit off and headbutted the fuck out of Maranda in retaliation, making her skid in the sand a bit. Then when he was breathing steadily, he shot a large fireball at the woman in front of him

Maranda didn't care about the fire ball and she let it hit her since fire is harmless to her. She was too busy holding her head, that freaking hurt! "God damn, why the hell do you have a skull that fucking thick? You over sized scaly hot air balloon!" Maranda huffed in sort of a pout.

Ari would have been laughing with Thane too if she hadn't been so busy trying to keep out of range of her own father's teeth. She calmly flipped around Mikey's snapping jaws before she hopped onto his head and slid down his neck. Then the blonde turtle girl ran over his back and down his tail before she stopped, perfectly balanced and waited for the head to come in again before she jumped out of the way at the last moment. The result was Mikey biting his own tail. He let out a half squeal, half roar sounding noise as his eyes began to water a bit. "Payback for all those pranks Daddy!" Ari grinned, then her eyes went wide as his head came back around again after spitting his tail back out. This time she squealed as he chased her.

"Oh please," Bailey sighed "I may not know much about who you are, but I know 100% it sure as hell isn't a Bishop minion. Snap out of it!" The woman of air maneuvered away from him, getting in pressure points here and there to make him spaz out and become tired and drag.

Mikey growled in frustration before he managed to pop the hell out of Bailey with his wing. But this distraction gave Ari the time and distraction needed to get back on his head and she tapped it to get his full attention. "Hey! You be nice Daddy!" Bailey caught herself in the air, she was flying again, but was too curious as to what Ari was up to to intervene just yet, the creative ones were always the most efficient in battle.

That stunt earned Ari a wild ride as Mikey shook his head, trying to shake the stubborn teen off who held firm to his horn. "Nope! Not letting go!" He decided to ram his head on the ground instead in an effort to get her off. The nimble youngster quickly dove off of his head, rolling as she hit the sand, and watched with amusement as Mikey's head hit the sand also, and kept going until it was fully submerged. He looked not unlike a large, reptilian, ostrich as he struggled to get his noggin free again. "Ok, I lied. I let go."

"It's like watching Tom and Jerry, Turtle and dragon version instead of cat and mouse." Baily snickered and gave Ari a high five for not disappointing

Carrie dove out of the way, dragging Donnie with her as more Steves were bringing in air strikes like dooms day. Carrie sent roots at the aircraft, getting them to snag on the wings and vital components, she got them caught in their engines and forced them to be grounded. When Donnie started to become an issue for her again, she quickly brought a hand up, some very large and very thick wooden roots trapped him. Carrie tried to keep him down so he wouldn't hurt himself, and so she could focus on grounding more fliers. These air strikes were becoming severely inconvenient, though that didn't stop Donnie from snapping at Carrie, much to her irritation as she kept a close eye on him and kept going after the Steves.

Lavi watched it all unfold. Frustration eating at her as she was continuously forced onto the sidelines by Ty. She should be out there, helping, and her twin kept getting in her way and forcing her back every time she tried, even as he worked with Megan to keep her Father occupied. The teen literally had tears of frustration in her eyes and her clenched fists were shaking. She was so upset she didn't notice the approach of someone behind her until a hand slapped over her mouth and she was dragged deeper into the tree line. And tried as much as she did, she couldn't break the hold. Mainly because she was too upset to focus. She could only helplessly struggle as she was pulled away from the fight she wanted so much to be a part of.

When the hand finally released, Lavi spun angrily, more than ready to knock the teeth out of whoever dared to drag her away from her family. Lavi caught her own strike in stunned recognition once she saw it was Jessica, mere inches from the non flinching woman's face. "Where did you come from?" She squeaked out, obviously startled to see her here. So far she had been MIA for the whole joyride.

Jessica merely drug her further into the tree line "Look, I've got an idea to isolate your dad and uncles, but I'll need your help. Mk? You ready for this?"

Lavi studied her a moment, then her eyes narrowed with determination and she gave a quick nod.

"Alright, trust me on this. Just run, in that direction, towards your babbo. I have a very stupid idea."

Fully trusting Jessica Lavi nodded again, spun and ran at top speed back to the beach turned battleground. Lavi was used to stupid ideas, her own family was full of them. Sad thing was they always worked.

She changed her course a bit, needing to come out of a different area that where Ty had firmly told her to stay...numerous times. If she was going to get past her brother, she needed surprise on her side. This was the reason she closed her busy twin out of the bond, so he was more than a little shocked, and angry, when she darted out of the treeline about a hundred and fifty feet further down. And there was no way in hell Ty was going to be able to intercept her from this distance before their father spotted her. Of course it helped that Ty was busy distracting the water dragon from a slowing down Megan. He didn't see her until Lavi shot past him like a shelled bullet, running right for her father.

And when Ty did notice, the reaction was expected. "God dammit Lavi! Stay in the damn woods!" Came his frustrated order, which she ignored. Her attention was on the dragon now looming in front of her.

Lavi was thrilled that it worked. His large blue eyes snapped to her and his head came around, leading his body that was stalking towards her now. It was at that point Lavi changed course and ran parallel to the woods. She had to give Jessica time to set what ever she had planned into motion. And she had to stay ahead of her rapidly closing in, cursing, brother. Now wasn't this fun...

The teen wasn't quite sure what she expected, but the large, elaborately painted pink and black female Cybertronian crashing out of the woodline wasn't it. Her eyes grew wide with shock before she rapidly calmed as she received a quick wink. When it reached for her and snagged Ty as well, Lavi's lack of resistance was mainly due to the shock that her new friend could even do this.

To keep up appearances the large hand tightened around Ty force out an irritated, and slightly surprised cry of minor pain. But not enough to seriously hurt him. And Lavi immediately understood what the crazy plan was when there was a low, warning growl from behind all three of them as the bot turned back towards the woods.

"You will be good experimental test subjects for my master Shockwave." Jessica said loudly, watching the twins and keeping sight of Leo from the corner of her optic.

Megan watched her cousin and leader, wondering how she could say that Shockwave was her master without busting out laughing, _and_ keep a straight face.

Carrie gave Donnie a flat look at the continuous attempted nips, and in retaliation, she put several more vines around his snout, also watching her idiotic leader attempt suicide with her stunt.

Ty still didn't get the memo of what was going on. His anger and frustration now interfering with the quiet words his sister was trying to send to him through the bond. "Ow! You fucking bitch! The hell you are!" He somehow managed to pull a sword out as he glared at the to him strange individual. "I'll take your damn hand off first if you don't turn us-oompf!" Lavi just gave up and elbowed him to get him to shut the hell up a moment so she could fill him quietly in. He just stared at her in disbelief as she just shrugged slightly back at him and jerked her head towards Leo who was watching intently, another low growl coming out of his throat as his head lowered, eyes narrowing. Ty still had to seriously resist a facepalm though, even as the dragon shook it's head. A moment of confusion washing over him.

Lavi felt it very prudent to bring something very important up to Jessica then as they all watched Leo struggle. "Be very, very careful. He knows how to deal with bots..." Shit, she didn't have to tell Jessica, she read plenty of files on this family, it was her duty to know what she was up against at all times, to keep her cousins and others under her leadership safe.

Leo growled again, his head lowering a little more as he continued to watch. Even stepped one foot forward, but still struggled to commit to the chase.

Lavi's eyes narrowed again, he obviously needed a firmer prod. "Put me down!" Jessica got ready to move but she kept a taunting expression at Leo, she forced a good snobby and cocky expression at the dragon.

Ty was looking very unthrilled over the whole idea as he rested an elbow onto a large robot finger and dropped his chin into his palm. Then he added in a flat tone. "Yeah...put us down..."

Thane found somthing else to laugh his ass off about. Even Ari's chuckles reached the twins, causing Ty to roll his eyes before he murmured quietly. "I'm never going to hear the end of this..."

Still Leo struggled with the conflicting emotions, still not quite there yet as his head weaved back and forth, another low growl sounding out.

"Shockwave isn't getting my baby!" Lavi then screamed, more than loud enough for her father to hear. Jessica froze at that.

"Well, I guess that is one way to tell him" Jessica mumbled causally.

Ty just turned his head to stare at his sister, full well knowing the shit storm she had just unleashed with that one statement, and a bit shocked she would risk Jessica like that. The look she gave him in return told him clearly what she was thinking. "What else is there left to try?"

And it worked. Leo's head snapped up, his eyes going wide with shock before he let out a thunderous roar, then his wings flared and he charged. Jessica was already turning around and taking off, knowing damn well what was going to happen now, without a doubt.

"Move!" Lavi snapped to Jessica. "Or he'll rip you apart!"

"So, dancing with him is out of the question?" Jessica couldn't help it. She had a tendency to have a smart mouth under a little, or a lot, of pressure.

"Leonardo!" Bishop's voice rang back out again. "Get back here!"

This time the command went ignored, and his furious charge continued after the stranger who was threatening to harm his children. Ty and Lavi exchanged hopeful glances, maybe this would work. If they could keep his focus. He only seemed to be able to break free for short times though, and they had no idea how much time they had. Again Ty wished his mother were here, the one they needed the most was missing. He was so frustrated over the fact that he almost missed hearing Bishop call the other dragons to retrieve their brother, just as another wave of Steves were coming in. Ty also missed Maranda's heavily irritated statement upon the retreat.

"Oh. My. Freaking. God! Tidalwave! I don't know what to compare your lard ass to first! A clown car for Steves or octomom with babies!"

Jessica lead him towards an outskirt, not stopping, especially when she felt the breeze caused by the snapping of jaws, but the large femme was fairly fast.

By that point Lavi was seriously growing concerned. Leo was close, very close, and he would not hesitate to turn Jessica into a pile of scrap parts.

Jessica quickly set the twins down out of the way and made sure to be careful with the carrying turtle especially. Upon setting them down, she quickly performed a forward rolling fall, in the middle of the roll, she changed back and shot blasts of light at Leo to make him see spots, that was followed by a relentless pulse of balance aura at him to knock him plenty far away, skidding across the ground. The dragon was stunned from the blast, Jessica wasn't trying to hurt him after all, he took the time to shake his head a few times to clear the fuzz. It also seemed that what ever ground they might have been able to gain with him had been lost again when he finally looked around again, his eyes once more empty and flat.

"Mk. Could have planned this through, like, a lot better." Jess quietly admitted to herself. She needed to set things into motion with her sister and she needed to move very quickly. She needed to find the vital components to this plan.

Ty caught the change immediately and pulled his sister deeper into the vegetation. "Fuck!" Ty snapped, barely able to restrain his frustration and anger anymore. "We lost him again!"

Lavi just let out a quiet, sad sigh of agreement as Leo stood still, his nose sniffing the air, obviously searching for them.

"Who's bright idea was this again?" Ty sarcastically mumbled to Lavi as they watched their father stalk in on them.

"Jessica's." Lavi shrugged even as they backed farther into the thick underbrush.

Ty just rolled his eyes. Why was he not surprised...

Leo was now dangerously close, a snarl on his face as he tracked the twins relentlessly down. The only thing that stopped him was the sound of Raph's roar as the large dragon flew directly towards his older brother. Leo turned to meet that charge, raising his front half up to catch the incoming flying dragon, obviously seeing that a fight was going to happen, and more than ready for it by the way it looked. The two collided and slammed into the ground hard enough to shake everything nearby. And their path took them towards the twins as they easily flattened trees around them.

By the time Donnie and Mikey hit the now larger clearing, Ty was wondering if they were ever going to make it out of this mess alive, because this shit storm just kept getting worse every time they turned around. Now the youngsters had to worry about staying hidden while also trying not to get flattened by the three on one melee that suddenly sprouted up.

Just a normal day in the turtle family, full of bad luck...


	14. Chapter 14

**Before we dig into this long overdue chapter, I want to apologize to everyone, including my co-writer on this story. I kinda fell off the face of the earth to you guys. Long story short, the last year + has been shit. Big piles of stinky, nasty, raunchy, moldy shit. One thing right after another with no room to breathe it seemed. I didn't abandon any of my stories, I promise you this. It's just taking me a very, very long time to recover from all the bullshit. Thank you for still sticking with me and being patient. Here is your reward.**

Somehow Ty and Lavi managed not to get squished in the initial tackle roll, but they now found themselves in a forest of large stomping dragon legs as the bodies wrestled above and all around them. No matter which way they turned, a leg or tail came slamming down to block their path. Ty was getting desperate now as he struggled to find a way to get his sister to safety, and couldn't. And it was with a fair amount of despair when he noticed Donnie's leg coming down, and this time they had nowhere to go.

The boulder that came from somewhere behind them to slam into the descending leg, knocking it off course, gave someone a chance to tackle the teens and roll with them out of harm's way. "What the hell are you waiting for! Christmas?" Cris snapped at her stunned and tired niece and nephew. "Move! Get the hell out of the way!"

Ty and Lavi both stared at her, both surprised by the fact she was here and by the fact that she had somehow managed to maneuver two fully grown turtles quite a distance on her own. How in the hell...

It just added onto their confusion when their mother ran past them, her eyes firmly locked onto her mate as he still tussled with his brothers. What made their eyes want to pop out of their sockets was the severely bloody wings she had coming out of her back, then they turned to Cris who was sporting a pair of her own. She just gave them a shrug as an answer, which really didn't help. "Long story, will explain later, kinda busy right now!" And with that she followed Vicky out to the dragons. "Stay put! I don't feel like saving your asses again!" she called over her shoulder as she went.

The twins just dumbly nodded. What else could they do?

Vicky knew firmly what she had to do however. Her eyes never left Leo as she twisted and dodged around the stomping and slamming limbs until she was close enough. Then, with a slight snarl of determination, she leaped high, her new wings aiding her with a mighty flap, and settled in a crouch onto Leo's back. She took a moment to fight off the dizzy spell that washed over her before getting to her feet and running along the large spine, towards his head. Which was a precarious situation on it's own since the fight never stopped to allow her to do so in peace. "Oh shit...oh shit...oh shit... Not a good idea...nope. Not at all...gonna get squished..."

Bre and Jess casually were repairing damage as the newbies went along, then they both went into their bot forms again, cracking their joints, ready to fight, they looked like twins, Bre being taller, she was sporting gold and pearl colored armor while Jess had the agressive black and pink scheme. Jess went after Leo holding him down but not knocking him down, seeing as Vicky was making her way along his back, she kept her weight on him to make squirming far more difficult.

The tall, still unsteady on her feet brunette dropped between the horns, hands placed firmly on the massive head that was still snapping and snarling as he tried to fend off his own brothers. She firmly pushed the danger around her out of her mind and concentrated on one thing, and one thing only. Her husband.

"Please Leo." She gritted through clenched teeth, her desperation clear to see on her face. "Please let me in this time."

Then she reached inside herself, and plunged to where he normally should be. Unsurprisingly, she found that blockade that had been in place since he had been gifted, and it was just as firm as it had been since the first time she felt the gentle closing of that door. But it also felt weaker than before, already giving under her first gentle push. Then she felt something, not Leo, but something else that was very familiar to her. A presence she couldn't forget even if she had only met him twice face to face.

' _Mizuchi?_ '

There was what felt like a shocked silence, then _'Water companion?'_

 _'Mizuchi! Let me in! I need to get to him!'_

 _'I can not. This, I have no control over. The power is being forced through me into him by an outsider. Here on the mortal realm, he has the control over what we have given him and someone controls him. I can do nothing to stop it.'_

Vicky groaned in her frustration, then snarled at the mental barrier that kept her separated from her turtle.

 _'So quick to give in? I sense something different about you child. You now have the means to reach him yourself. The barrier does not belong here anymore, and it is time you removed it.'_

A calming breath was taken by the frustrated and tired woman, then she gathered herself and dove in again. This time not tentatively reaching for the barrier, but intending to smash right through the son of a bitch. The strain was clear to see on her face. Eyes closed as she held onto him for dear life physically as she waged this tremendous mental battle. She. Would. Not. _Lose!_ Not this time!

And Leo stopped in mid lunge. Body froze in place, one paw lifted slightly off of the ground, as his head snapped sharply upwards. His eyes now flickering from the dull void that had taken over to filling with his own inner fire. Wavering between the two as his nostrils flared, head tilting as if trying to listen for something he couldn't quite hear.

It didn't go unnoticed. The twins watched wide eyed, both still in shock over their Mother's appearance and in hope once they saw their Father still. Lavi clung to her brother, her own face filled with desperation as tears of hope gathered in her eyes. "Please. Please god, let her get through to him this time."

Jess also seemed to sense the shift and backed off, watching intently but with a small smile. Ready incase the dragon made a move to throw the stubborn woman off.

They weren't the only ones who noticed the lag in the eldest dragon. Three other snapping maws closed in on the blankly staring Leonardo. Their eyes still dull and lifeless.

Then the large clearing lit up with light and heat as a massive fire ball flew across the empty space, missing Raph by inches to slam into the trees behind him, and promptly ignited a large forest fire.

"Dammit!" Cris snapped, her face twisted with embarrassed frustration. "This shit is harder than it looks. Hey stupid! Over here!" She picked up a safer item to throw, a big stick, and that aim was more true despite the incredible force behind the swing. Again the twins stared. There was no way in hell that throw would have connected under normal circumstances. Raph's head was too high and out of her reach...but there he was, swinging his head around because he just got slapped with the silly stick. Opening his mouth to let out an irritated roar at his tiny mate. Tiny mate that fluffed her blood soaked wings in irritation. "Oh, shut up Big Mouth!"

By now Marina and Caitlin were there also. Both scrambling around feet and tails as they single mindedly went for the other two. Marina managing a horizontal roll over Mikey's foot as it stomped to the ground, her new wings hindering her only slightly. When she landed on her feet, her eyes were already glowing and she snapped a hand up, and the response was a pillar of earth that shot up and nailed Mikey right in the snout. "Dammit! I was trying to pin his feet!" She almost screeched as she dove out of the way of Raph's incoming tail.

"I told you this shit was hard!" Cris yelled back, now trying to concentrate harder. This time red glowing eyes resulted in another fireball that flung from her hands, and this one slammed right into Donnie's gaping maw. He actually looked stunned for a moment, shaking his head as it pulled back, letting out a small confused snort. That lasted only for a second then he snapped his head forward again, and this time Cris met him with a stream of fire. "Vicky! An idea of what you are doing would be-" She cut off as Caitlin hit the ground unceremoniously on her bottom, hard, right next to the fire throwing woman. "What the fuck? Where did you come from?"

"Oww..." Caitlin struggled to her feet, rubbing her bottom. "Flying is harder than it look too."

"Move!" Marina pushed Caitlin out of the way as Mikey breathed dragon fire at them. Caitlin screamed in fright and the fire was pushed up and over them by a gust of wind that suddenly sprouted from the blonde's hands.

"Mikey!" Caitlin screamed. "If you don't knock that off you aren't going to get laid for a month!" Mikey paused in the act of snapping at them, his eyes looking confused for a moment before he shook his head and came in again. Caitlin squealed now instead and scrambled with Marina out of the way.

"Vicky!" Marina snapped this time as she looked up at her friend. "We need you!"

Vicky couldn't help them. Her attention given only to the dragon she was still holding onto. Ty and Lavi just stared at their aunts a moment. Not sure what the hell to think any more before they moved their eyes to their parents, and their mouths dropped open in wonder. Vicky's eyes were glowing brightly, wings flared as the glow exploded from her and surrounded Leo. Massive trails of water formed in those tendrils of light, snaking around the pair as Vicky's face now began to snarl from the effort. Still the large dragon didn't move, but his own eyes began to glow to match hers.

"What in the hell is going on?" Ty held his awed and frightened sister even closer. Neither one of them daring to move. This was out of their league, and they knew it.

Jessica watched the snarling Raph calmly as he circled her, finally he pounced and she fell back with him, grabbing his legs and kicking him over her, he hit a nice sized tree knocking it down. He got up to charge Jessica again but instead Cris made her second advance, which immediately got his attention. It was frustrating how the turtles kept going after their families. The Elemental girls could take the hit, their mates especially right now and their children? couldn't. Jessica was about to charge Raph, but wouldn't make it in time.

"Will you quit you idiot!" Cris snapped, now close to panicking since she knew there was no way to get past him this time. "Snap out of it already!"

And he did stop, but not because Cris told him too. There was a thunderous roar in the clearing. One that had the twins and most of the mates wide eyed. They knew that sound, that particular loud pitch. They had heard it before. And knew it to be a roar of victory. Only a moment they had to register it before Leo slammed into Raph, jaws clamped tight as he bowled his brother over, tail lashing, claws digging in to hold, and his eyes fully clear as he glared his snapping brother down.

Vicky had leapt from the back of him mere moments before he had collided and scrambled to get out of the way. Stumbling as she tried to make her over tired body get the hell out of the way of a fight she couldn't fight anymore. She didn't have too. The happy smile on her face, though still tinted with worry, proved along with her own tears of relief that she had succeeded. She had finally gotten through to him. And now he was one pissed mother fucker. Raph didn't stand a chance against that. Especially when Jessica came to help hold him down. "Cris! Hurry dude!"

Cris nodded and ran up to Raph as he thrashed. Still trying to fight both his brother and the female bot holding him down. Jessica wrapped an arm around his head, forcing it to remain still so Cris could get her hands on him. And that is all it took. Once again, the dragon stilled and the Mate started to glow, fire flaring around them this time instead of water. "You better be glad I fucking love you...you large pain in my ass..." Cris growled through the strain, then grew quiet with her own struggle. Both Leo and Jessica released the large dragon, then set their sights on the remaining two.

Bre on the other hand was already set on Donnie, the turtle dragons were outnumbered, even more so now with two back to normal, Donnie by some grace of god, smart little fucker, got Bre off balance and tackled her, she was about to make another move when a massive rock swatted Donnie upside the head. He was stunned and froze at that, like a cat that knew he did something bad or something. _'Don't fucking laugh Bre, or at the minimum, laugh later. get your shit together'_ she quickly regained the upper hand, and got a now frantically squirming Donnie to the ground. But he was putting up too much of a fight for Marina to get too close. That's when Jess got back into the scene, tackling him again as he breathed more fire. Bre easily threw a hand up, dissipating it before it scorched her sister.

It sucked, the whole situation sucked. She couldn't hurt them, she fully understood why they were the way they were right now and would never hurt innocent lives, especially when they were being controlled by someone else. It just made things a little difficult is all. She kept the dragon busy with Jessica while Marina was doing what she could to gain her bearings and figure out how things worked. Bre was fairly good at dragon wrangling, especially in her bot form. And with the aid of her sister to help hold him, Bre pretty much hogtied his feet by grabbing them with her hands "Marina! Your turn!"

The black haired woman wasted no time in running up to the large dragon, her hands clamping down on his head. Donnie too, grew very still after a few moments, spirals of dust and rocks now circling the air around the pair as Marina concentrated with everything she had.

Bre quickly went after Mikey again while her sister handled Donnie, both tapping into some godly strength as they tussled. Mikey managed to pounce on Bre's back, but with a clean forward rolling fall and using the momentum for a throw after getting up, she threw him to the ground and went for a pin. The pearl colored femme nodded at Caitlin. And the cycle repeated itself. Caitlin was the last one needed to make that connection, and the wind that sprung up into the now much larger clearing told everyone that she was trying her damndest to do just that.

It seemed to take forever, fire, earth and wind filled the clearing in an awesome spectacle as Leo watched with narrowed, wary eyes. Wings slightly bent. On the alert just incase one of the women couldn't push through. But his worry was unfounded. One by one the girls let their hands fall, their expressions weary, but happy as they looked up at clear eyes dragons. They all blinked in confusion, then anger. Wings flaring out as all four looked back towards shore. With swift beats of those massive wings, they lifted off again, heading back to the coast, and back to a fight that wasn't over just yet.

"That...was the hardest thing I've ever had to do..." Caitlin murmured as she collapsed to her knees. Her sisters didn't look much better, Vicky was even leaning heavily on Ty who had now moved forward. But even in this state, they refused to just collapse, their intent now to make it to the ocean, and a long overdue reunion.

Ty gently guided his Mother towards the water, and the only thought on his stunned mind at the moment was: "Dad is going to lose his shit when everything calms down..."

Lavi just nodded dumbly as she followed, guiding her exhausted Aunt Caitlin.

.

.

Megan looked back out to shore, she was back on the beach after she ensured the twins were ok, but man, what a time to come back, she cursed when Tidalwave made it to shore, and let out many, many, many Bishop goons, and Steves, and started to transform.

"Well, on the bright side, we can hurt them" Maranda pointed out as she sent a massive wave of fire at some Bishop goons.

Carrie casually made the sand turn into quicksand and caught a strike from one of the goons, getting into hand to hand combat with one of them, which was very, very quick. She reached to her back and threw her AK in the air so Megs could snatch it in mid front flip, land in front of a goon, shoot him in the chest, take a weird spiked grenade, slammed it on his his skull, and kicked him into a crowd of Bishop goons and Steves. The sight after that was not so pretty, everyone turning to ash and dissipating into guts on the farther radius of the blast.

"Wheeljack's invention works." Megs stated in her usual droned out voice.

"Well at least one does!" Carrie snarled, butt hurt still by that stupid as shit GPS.

Megan looked at the dead Bishop pawns. That calm, heartless expression sitting on her face with much familiarity as she made sure not a single one was moving, then looked up at the Steves that just keep freaking coming. She was able to get out of the way of the next airstrike, barely, but she was taking what she was getting at this point. She was slowing down, yes, but she wasn't going to stop fighting until their mission was complete.

Carrie shot a large chunk of earth into the air, hitting a steve to break him to pieces and a couple other Steves ran into those perfectly timed, flying debris, destroying them too.

Megan turned her attention back to Tidalwave, raising a hand into the air. As she did, it made a very large wave, one that easily towered over the massive Tidalwave, then slammed into him with such force it rips a decent amount of body armor off of him. Megan started to look more pale with the more of her abilities she's using in such close proximity of chaos crystal. And by close proximity, she was talking about the shrapnel both in her and covering the beach around her. It was beginning to affect her and her cousins all. Not the first time they may need to fight without powers, they were still deadly without the abilities. But they were getting weaker, they needed to start making their abilities count.

Meg's cousin was catching on to how sick she was getting, and it was starting to show. She needed to help her, she sent a massive blast of fire at Tidalwave to shoot him into the air before he could land, keeping him down and buying them more time. He may make the turtle dragons look like puppies (by size alone) but getting thrashed around like he was, he was looking like a rag doll. In a blender.

Bailey, on the other hand, found Bishop, giving him a right hook into his face, knocking him to the ground

"Found you." she cracked her knuckles and stalked up to him. But, of course, Bishop pulled out a handgun and popped Bailey in the chest, not a good place to get hit. Bailey growled in pain as she hit the ground, not expecting Bishop to be able to muster up chaos crystal rounds that small. Why did he even pack them? It made no sense, the Elementals didn't get involved until a couple days ago. How did he get materials to take them down so quickly? She was snapped out of her thought process when she heard Bishop cock the hammer of the gun, and she looked up to see the barrel was eye level with her. This shit... Was gonna hurt.

All of a sudden Ari came out of nowhere, jumping high enough to get land on his shoulders, allowing herself to fall back, her move reminded the air pusher of a catapult. She flung Bishop away from the brown haired, brown eyed woman. Who forced herself back up, ignoring the burn of the round he used. Bailey gave a grateful nod of thanks to the young pink masked turtle who brushed it off in a: "don't mention it" fashion. The commotion they heard shortly after made Bailey run back out with Ari, the other turtle younglings at her side. She spread her wings and took off after the flying Steves. Unfortunately, the crystal was doing a large number on her too, but not as bad as poor Megan though, who was still creating tempests from hell at Tidalwave.

Dante wasn't liking what he was seeing, running to the water pusher with the concern clear on his face. "You seriously need to stop! Even i can see what is happening to you!"

"Maaaaan..." Thane whined as he looked around at the ongoing chaos. "This shit storm just keeps getting stinkier!"

Dante paused in the middle of trying to tend to Megan, staring incredulously at Thane. "The crap that comes out of your mouth sometimes...you are as bad as Ari."

"I heard that, and I'm insulted!" Ari hollered as she sauntered easily along the debris littered beach. " _No one_ is as bad as me! Except for Daddy... " The blonde looked off into the treeline and sighed. "I hope they got something figured out..."

Thane just rolled his eyes before laying a hand on Megan's shoulder. Both to hold her down and to try and comfort her pain in some way. That quickly turned into a harder grip as he pulled her out of the way of more incoming fire. Dante was already dodging in another direction.

Megan gave a nod at Thane. "Thank you." and back into the fight she went, she was taking what Dante "suggested" now, just sticking to weapons instead of using her powers. But she was not going to stop fighting, that is not how she has survived for as long as she has.

Maranda was now getting very, very irritated. Ok she started the day out like that when she burned her waffles this morning, but right now? Very much so. Tidalwave was starting to get back up

"How about you stay down, you fucking dick wizard!" She growled

Bailey willed the air between the parts of a Steve to make him just break apart violently, then physically got her hands on another flying vehicon and ripped him clean in half. These weren't innocent turtle dragons, she can and will tear them the hell apart. After that session, she growled in irritation when more fliers were coming in, the air strikes made it dangerous for the younglings and the elemental girls did what they could to steer them clear of the fight.

But she had to pause, then dove out of the way of the large, very hot stream of Dragon fire that suddenly exploded past her. Leading the charge of the four massive dragons. Roars were heard next as claws were extended and flexed. Catching Steves and just clean ripping them apart even as they flew on. Maranda was next to be passed, Raph eyeing her hard before he focused back in on the bigger threat around them, almost casually swatting the foe the fire girl was engaged with far out to sea.

Carrie was ready for round umpth with the turtles but seemed a little relieved when they went after the enemy, the two beaten to hell N.E.S.T girls went back to the ground to ensure their relatives were ok. Their attention was turned casually to their leader and their second command who were returning in their bot forms with the tired new elemental women, also Lavi and Ty, because why not? were secured in the arms of their bot forms.

"Ok, now take it easy, no more fighting on your end, you are going to be exhausted. If you aren't already" Jessica said as she and her sister ever so gently set the exhausted women down in a safe area in the treeline, ready to defend them. Which would probably be the only time they would ever really need to protect them.

Bre watched the battlefield with irritation, right before blasting an enemy to ash near a beaten to hell Megan. Fortunately for everyone besides Megs, Jessica saw her condition and stubbornness.

"Megan! Stand down!"

Megan gave a large, seething glare at her cousin

"With all due respect, I am fine Supereon." she huffed.

Jess rolled her eyes and muttered: "Half fucking dead over there." Jessica raised her voice from the mumble tone to something louder. "I know you're not, because A. you are arguing with a direct order from your Supereon, and B. you look like a beaten to hell ghost, now find a place to sit or I will come over there!"

Megan's blue eyes glared a hole into Jessica's soul and her glower intensified. To any other person, she would look terrifying, but to her cousin and leader? Not so much, she did indeed sit down, exhaustion truly hitting her after that, and the pain, holy crap, at least while she fought she was distracted from it.

"You're impossible sometimes you Hydro" Carrie huffed. Crossing her arms and watching the turtle dragons go to town on the enemies, which was satisfying in so many ways, especially with the fact they had control and could take out that seething anger on the ones that had them in collars.

Thane was cheerfully watching the dragons tearing into the massive Decepticon, slowly but surely ripping Tidalwave apart. He turned and, grinning, said to Maranda. "Just think...that coulda been you."

"Knock it off..." Ty popped Thane on the arm before looking at his mother with the concern he obviously still felt at her appearance. Vicky and the others needed to rest, or...something. But it was just as obvious that they weren't going to do that. Not until they could for certain say they had gotten what they had came for.

Even now, Vicky watched intently. Her eyes glued to Leo as his own tail slammed into a drone hard enough to send it towards shore, past them, and it landed quite some distance behind them in the forest.

The whole family winced at that one.

"Think he is mad?" Ty asked.

"Maybe just a little." Lavi answered mildly, still trying to support her Aunt.

Finally, what was left of the large robot succumbed to the onslaught of the four wrathful Dragons. Only then did Mikey reach out to snag the last drone, ripped the head off and tossed it to Donnie, who happily slapped it with his tail towards Raph, he bopped it to Leo. And Leo slammed the ever living hell out of it with a derisive snort, sending it flying waaaaaaaaay the fuck out there. The look Mikey gave him clearly told everyone that he wasn't happy about losing his new ball.

Leo just snorted again and banked towards shore.

One by one they slowly lowered themselves to the sand, four sets of eyes now carefully watching the scene if front of them, not quite sure what to make of this group of newcomers. Wings twitched a few times as the dragons began to walk closer, looking a bit tired, but obviously in full control of themselves.

Well, obvious to their family anyway. Maranda wasn't so easily convinced, especially when Leo let out a low warning growl, his tail thrashing back and forth in his agitation.

That is when a now furious Maranda stood in front of her downed cousin who was looking at Leo with confusion, and something else that was unreadable in her cold ice blue eyes, she did turn away as she held her injuries with a wince. Maranda was assuming it was because of her injuries anyway, whatever it was it was seriously hurting her. Megan had no adrenaline or strength left to hide her pain at this point and hated feeling and looking vulnerable to anyone, especially strangers. Bre saw it, unnerved, both Leo and Inferna can cause a lot of damage and they were both tired and weak and in no mood for bull shit.

"Stand down Inferna, they are back to normal" Bre assured.

"Him fucking first" The fire pusher snarled, she felt her cousin's distress and pain through their large family bond, the water pusher was too weak to hide that too at the moment and Maranda wasn't scared on acting on the protective instincts for her family. "We are no threat to your family, but if you make a move on mine I will fucking destroy you. She's down, she's hurt, back off" Maranda hissed at the dragon.

Leo's eyes narrowed more at her, but his gaze quickly shifted to Lavi who was now running up to him, Ari was already on the move towards Mikey. Both females seeming to easily glide over the sand as they ran towards their fathers. Leo lowered his head to his daughter, and she clung tight to his snout, crying as she hugged it firmly. Mikey had scooped Ari up in his paw and held her close to his chest, his own snout gently nudging the second crying girl.

The rest of the turtle family now started to follow, the sons trying to hold the weakened mothers up on their feet as they closed the distance. The women were stumbling, tripping and just over all having a difficult time with the sand, but god damn it they wanted their husbands and nothing was going to stop them at this point. The air shimmered around the dragons, revealing the true forms of the turtles mere moments before the wives slammed into them. Leo was now struggling to hold onto both daughter and wife. But he managed. Holding them both tight against him as he rested his head on theirs, eyes closed to hold back his own tears. Mikey didn't even try to stay on his feet. When Caitlin crashed into him, the whole family just toppled over into the sand and another massive hug fest ensued.

Thane was a bit more subtle in his observation, watching his parents quietly, but with a small smile. Then quickly wiped a tear away before anyone could see it.

"Thank you." Ty said quietly to Jessica, his own eyes misty as he watched. "I don't think words can express how much this meant to all of us."

"No need for thanks Ty. It's appreciated, but think of it as a makeup for being ass holes upon our first encounter." Jess was just happy things weren't as tense. She shot the teen a sheepish and amused smile.

Dante gave his parents a moment of privacy that they obviously needed. Smiling as he watched the long hug. Then walked over to Megan. "You look like shit."

"I'm fine. I have had a lot harder hits in the past, go spend time with your father." Megan just wanted Dante to leave her alone, for several reasons. A. she already drew waaay too much attention, she hates drawing attention to herself with (despite being a water girl) a fiery passion. B. she knows she'll be dealing with Carrie and Ratchet and really doesn't want another one on her plate.

Speaking of which...

Carrie smacked her upside the head and snarled in a foreign language that almost sounded like Cybertronian, but not quite.

 _"I knew you weren't feeling 100% before the mission, but on top of that, why would use your powers when you got 10 flipping pounds of shrapnel in your chest!"_

"I think you're being a little over dramatic." Megan gave her an irritated huff at the smack, already banged up enough without it. She watched Carrie get on her comm link and call for a ground bridge

"We have more pressing matters to deal with. The turtles still have foreign tech in them, and the turtle angels need energon and to be cleaned up." Megan insisted. She's been through a transformation before, and didn't want them to go through it alone without any guidance whatsoever.

"Supereon!" Carrie hollered

"I am not getting involved... Handle it" Jessica raised a brow. But her earth wielding cousin and Water pusher cousin were both vicious in their current states, and one was going to just have to out stubborn the other.

Bre snickered at her sister. "Coward."

"Damn right." Jessica wasn't going to deny that one, her cousins were scary.

Carrie hauled Megan up to support her, Baily following close to them, knowing better than to argue with her already riled up medic. Megan batted away her help, she was so irritated.

"Aquarius what is going on with you, why are you acting like this?" Carrie let the name slip, they really had nothing to hide at this point anyway.

"I should have known better" Megan muttered lowly, almost too quietly for Carrie to hear, right before she felt a strange betrayal going through her cousin via the bond for a moment. Then her end of the bond was dampened up tightly, but didn't miss the quick glance her cousin shot at the turtles, mainly the blue masked leader. That confused the shit out of the N.E.S.T medic.

The turtle Family couldn't focus on that argument at the moment. Each Father was still up to his ears in wife, and in some cases, daughter. Vicky was clinging to Leo with a vise like grip. Her face buried in the crook of his neck as her body shuddered with her relieved sobs. He did what he could to sooth her, all the while staring at her new, bloody, wings with wide blue eyes.

"You guys ok?" Ty inquired, stepping closer to his father and trying to gauge him for any injuries that might have been carried over to his normal form.

"We are fine son." Was the quiet reply from a somewhat bewildered Leonardo. "As fine as can be expected. What happened?" His voice was soft as he held Vicky closer against him, a finger tentatively reaching towards one of the new appendages. But before Vicky could even begin to explain, her body went limp in his arms. Days worth of exhaustion filled searching combining with the stress of her change finally pushed her over the edge. Now that Leo was safe, she could let herself go. That did not sit well with the leader, his lips tightened into a thin line as he raised his eyes from the woman he now held bridal style against his chest to the new figures roaming the beach. "What. _Happened_!" His tone wasn't so soft this time.

"Somebody better tell me who I can hit!" Raph roared from right behind him. "Because I'm gonna to hit someone! Very fucking hard!" The largest turtle's eyes were also aimed at the strangers. And Cris was in just as bad shape, passed out and draped in his arms.

"I knew it..." Ty muttered quietly to Lavi, right as Leo's eyes began to flare up. Indicating a serious beatdown on anyone whom he perceived to have caused his family any kind of harm. And the blood on the new wings was a large indicator that there had been harm done in his eyes.

"Daddy...please..." Lavi intervened, stepping in front of him and the possible targets of his ire. "Don't do anything to them. They really did help."

"Then somebody better start talking!" Leonardo's eyes flared even brighter. It wouldn't take much more to push him into dragon mode again at this point.

Jessica ran up to Megan and Bailey once her watch duty of the turtle angels wasn't needed anymore. "Hey you guys o-..." she was cut off by an angry glow eyed blue masked turtle, her shoulders slumped and her expression looked fucking done. "Oh for the love of God what did we do now?"

"They want to know what happened to their mates." To which, all the girls looked at Jessica, pursing their lips in a non verbal "Yeah, I'm not telling them."

"Oh you guys suck." she said mildly at her family before turning to the turtles, she was so not in the mood for this bull shit, not today.

"So we were in Canada and lost reception-" and for that smart ass remark she got a nice, expected, swat upside the head and she gave her cousins a flat look.

"Ok. Calm down Leo. So. Our fathers, were all like: hey, turtles are brainwashed. No shit. But you can't fix them. But your buddies here can. Referring to your girls. They told them they can give the abilities to save you guys. So, naturally, your girls took the chance to enhance all their properties so they could connect to you guys mentally and spiritually and fight the corruption/brainwashing that was taking over your entity-er, totem spirit. They aren't used to their powers yet. Not to mention the transformation into becoming wing sabers/demigods is extremely taxing on the body. And as for the blood, wings will rip out of your back when you first get them. That's why they're bloody." Jessica chipped in at the end, nodding.

"You couldn't put that more delicately?" Bre raised a brow at her leader.

"Ok, scratch that last part yo-"

"Just shut up while you're behind" Maranda huffed, speaking from experience. They were all still grouchy and high on adrenaline, but it was wearing off gradually.

"Ok." Jess sighed.

Bre or Starblast as she's was becoming known as, looked at her sister and started to speak to her in a different language, the same strange language as before. _"Had to add that tidbit that they were our dads right?"_

Jessica looked at her sister tiredly _"A. Keeping information from them just leads to trouble. The more details the easier later on B. Us disowning them changes nothing biologically. And C. Not going to be the first time we get an ass beating because of who our fathers are. So you might as well get over it/ used to it"_

Leonardo looked at Jessica long and hard, listening to Lavi as she still quietly murmured reassurances to her concerned father. His eyes traveled from Jessica, to Vicky and back to Jessica again. Still very, very angry. "There was no other way? Your all powerful fathers couldn't do anything?! They had to go through this? My god the damn pain!" Leo lifted his eyes to the heavens, a sneer of hate and disdain clear to see on his face.

"Oh they could have, but they are pure bread ass holes. So." Jess simply replied, but watching the large turtle with a hint of wariness. Lord she really didn't want to fight any more today.

"Leo?" This voice was also familiar to him, and sounded so very, very weak. Caitlin was being cradled by Mikey. And by the looks of her it was a wonder she wasn't passed out cold herself. "It's ok...really... she knew the stakes, we all did."

"I'm still gonna hit someone!" Raph bellowed, not at all calmed by the explanation.

"Get in line bitch." Inferna muttered under her breath, getting an elbow to the gut by Bre.

"Join the club." Leo growled from between clenched teeth. "I can imagine the pain they must have went through, I know what our transformation felt like." He looked back down at Vicky, his eyes softening as he reached out to gently touch a wing.

"Tell you what." Maranda nodded to Raph. "Next time we get summoned. We'll bring you up with us. By the by," she slapped a $100 in one of his pouches like she just gave a waiter a tip. "Give that to Cris when she wakes up. We made a bet and she did it, for the most part."

That earned her a warning growl for getting to close, and an eyeroll from Thane. The son had to quickly place a restraining hand on his father's arm to keep him from lashing out. "Easy Dad. They really don't mean any harm."

Raph grumbled instead. "I'm too scared to ask what the bet was."

Maranda or "Inferna" got an evil grin on her face when Raph decided so be stand offish. Her leader cousin of course ruined the fun by giving her a scolding glare.

"Behave yourself, they've been through enough."

"Fine fine. Any other circumstance I'd blow that order off. But. You're right, They've been through enough. And for the record," Her words now aimed back at Raph "it was to punch a god in the face, she threw a couple Kunai knives at him. Close enough. Would have hit him too."

"I don't know...I kinda like the wings." Ari spoke up from where she was sitting on a tree branch, casually swinging her legs.

"Me too cupcake." Mikey grinned up at her.

Ty shook his head over it all before letting out a soft sigh. He figured at this point, it would be wise to turn the strangers into, non strangers before someone got decked. "Guys, this is my father, Leonardo." His expression turned a little rueful. "I'm sure you've heard of him. And his reputation. Also, my Uncles Michelangelo, Raphael and Donatello."

Bre smiled at the turtles very warmly, trying to disarm them a little from their ruffled stance. "It's a pleasure to meet you guys. Sorry it was on these terms though. I'm Starblast, this is my sister Starstriker. And that is our cousin Inferna. We can introduce you to the others after they are treated."

Inferna waved at them, a serious expression on her face.

Dante walked up behind Donnie and looked curiously at the back of his neck. Obviously ready to move the conversation past the tense moment. "What happened here?" He reached out and carefully touched a large bump on the back of his father's neck.

"Bishop happened, that's what."

"Alrighty then. Looks like you guys need to be looked over too."

"Them first." Leo interrupted firmly. Which them he meant was pretty obvious to everyone at this point.

Dante rubbed the back of his head a he looked everyone over. "Not sure Tony is equipped to deal with...um...well...this. I know _I'm_ not."

Jessica, or starstriker as she was also known, smiled reassuringly. "I'll get Jolt to treat the turtle angels. Ratchet and First Aid can work on you guys. There's not much to be done for the ladies. Any damage their bodies sustained should healed by morning. They need to be cleaned up and get some energon. We'll get everything figured out once we get back to a base. Ratchet is probably doing some quick spark shock therapy on our cousins and that doesn't take to long so we'll send him over right after."

Leo pulled his wife even tighter against his chest, if that was even possible. His eyes on the verge of flaring again. "She can't have energon, it will kill her!"

Ty just calmly rolled his eyes. "I'm sorry. They are very over protective. Hence the reason they are so...short and snappy right now. Just give them time to adjust to the situation."

"Except for Raph." Mikey grinned. "He's always an ass." That earned him a kick since Raph's arms were full of knocked out Cris. "See what I mean?"

Ty called Kyle for a bridge, listened...then winced a little as he turned to his twin. "You are in some serious trouble sis."

"It was worth getting yelled at." Lavi sighed.

Once more it was Dante that moved the conversation forward. "Um...would it inconvenience one of you too much to hang out with us for a bit?" He was looking at his newly transformed mother, who was also dead to the world right now. "There are obviously some things we need to know."

"I'll come with you." Jessica offered before turning to her own crew. "Guys, can you bring wing solution when you switch bases?" Jessica asked, looking at her family to which she got a quick Okie dokie symbol from her sister as she continued to keep walking looking chill like nothing happened.

Jessica followed everyone through but hung back a bit as the turtle family lead the way to the med bay. She couldn't help the barrage of stress going over her, not liking this family getting dragged into her affairs. Her family could handle themselves but she didn't even like for them to get dragged into everything. She had so much to do, and had to help the new women just turned elemental out in figuring out their new bodies. She had too much on her plate and despite years of practice, she still didn't know if she would be able to handle taking care of everyone, especially when she currently couldn't take care of herself.


	15. Chapter 15

The corridor was cleared by Ari, who ran ahead. Warning anyone walking the halls to not get in front of the still angry turtles who followed. Then she wisely held the door open to the lab/medbay, before Raph kicked it in. Jessica followed, just watching for now.

Tony, who was browsing through some charts at the time, looked up. Just a bit startled at the sudden entrance of the turtles. "Holy shit! They found you! Are you-" He cut off the obvious question, his face taking on an incredulous confused look when he noticed the changed women. "What happened to them?"

Thane sighed as he turned towards Ty. "We are going to be answering that question a lot i think."

Ty just nodded in agreement while Leo just clenched his jaw. With a slight shake of his head, the message was relayed to Tony that he didn't want to talk about this right now. Not until his anger had calmed a lot more. Tony knew Leonard well enough to humor him, and to understand the reason for his grumpy mood, and tailored his words in an understanding tone "Bring them over here guys." pointing to the row of human sized beds opposite the bot sized berths. "We'll talk about that part later."

Leo followed, then looked at the bed, then down at Vicky in his arms, then back to the bed. His eyes fully of frustration now instead of anger as he struggled to figure out how in the hell to lay her down without...without accidentally hurting these new appendages. No matter which way he turned her, she was going to get one of those wings pinned or shooting off at a painful angle.

Lavi could see the frustration and helplessness, build in her father. He had been through so much already and Vicky's transformation wasn't helping ease that tired soul. But she also knew that he would not rest if his mate wasn't cared for properly. It was just the way he was. "Just lay her on her side for now, Dad." The young female stepped forward and held the wings up so he could do just that. "It might be easier to clean them anyway like that. So we don't have to move her too much."

Leo nodded, placing his burden ever so gently down. Then his eyes were transfixed on those wings. Those bloodstained wings that hadn't been there the last time he saw her. And it was the sight of her dried blood that started his own to boil. He calmed himself with a deep, long sigh before turning to face Jessica. His eyes steely. "I hope your fathers fully understand that they will answer for what they did. if not, I'll make them understand."

Every single turtle tot winced at that, and even Tony pursed his lips and looked off in a different direction a moment. No one really wanted to see _that_ fight. Though Jessica did raise a somewhat amused brow at him, she remained quiet. Probably because she would be eating popcorn and rooting for the turtle.

Ty immediately moved in to distract his father once the mates had been all settled down. Gently turning Leo by the arm so he had his sire's full attention. "We'll go back to the lair and get some clean things for them to wear. I have a feeling Mom at least is going to be in a sweats and bathrobe mood for a few days."

Leo nodded before turning back to Vicky, but someone else wanted to add onto that list. "Grab some pizzas too!" Mikey called from across the room. That was met with a quiet giggle from Ari. Ty just rolled his eyes as he led his team back out.

Lavi was stopped from following, now it was her turn to have a hand placed on her arm to halt her movement and she turned to questiongly look at her father, who was in return watching her intently. Then he smiled. "Is it true?" His tone was now soft, and a little hope sparkled in his eyes.

Lavi let her excited grin show before she nodded happily. Now grinning himself, Leo pulled her into a fierce hug. "I'm so happy for you, turtle dove, but you shouldn't have been out there." He mixed his scolding with a kiss to her forehead.

" _Da-ad!_ " Lavi blushed. Both the scolding and the signs of affection from her sometimes stern father embarrassing her to no end. "Do you _have_ to do that?"

"What part? The scolding, or the kiss?" He was smiling now, his eyes holding that mischevious gleam in them.

"Both." Lavi answered in a flat tone.

"Well...then yes to both. I'm your father and I'll yell at you and kiss your forehead if I want."

She sighed in exasperation, he just laughed and hugged her again.

Mikey had settled in a chair, his feet propped carefully on Caitlin's bed as he watched. Then he grinned towards Jessica, not having any problem trying to break the ice between the two groups. "That's the Leo we all know and love. See? He's not always a sourpuss."

Lavi cracked up laughing at Leo's expression as he attempted to glare a grinning Mikey down. Mikey wasn't phased one bit by it. Leo finally gave up and addressed his next words to jessica, who had sofar remained silent. He regarded her a long, quiet moment. Everything playing again in his mind, then he spoke. "My brothers and I owe you and your team a thanks it seems. Not only for helping us, but for helping my family as well."

"No need for that." Jessica replied. "We were just doing our job. Besides. If it wasn't for us. They wouldn't have been turned anyway. Least I can do is help them adjust. Help all of you adjust. As for our fathers? There's no hope for them. They've been due for a pounding, for a long time now" Jessica couldn't help but to be bitter taste at the mention of Photo, but she is ADD and her mind was taken off of it, she gave Lavi a genuine smile "and congratulations by the way."

Lavi blushed again, but was still smiling as she started passing out blankets. "Thank you." She handed Leo a blanket, and he in return promptly turned to cover Vicky.

Raph, however had his own two cents to put in. "I'll be happy ta give them that pounding."

Leo's jaw clenched, wholeheartedly agreeing with his brother for once, but he was calm again when he turned back to Jessica. "To be honest, I don't really blame you for what happened." Once more the muscles in his jaw moved to press his teeth together. Lavi began to slightly worry that he was going to crack his teeth if he kept that up. "I fully understand the gods are difficult to deal with."

"Most of them." Mikey corrected from his chair, leaning back comfortably in it and clasping his hands behind his head as the front legs lifted off of the floor. "One of them ain't so bad. Shame she is the only one, until now." Mikey winked at their new companion.

Jessica blinked at Mikey with curiosity, internally grateful Leo didn't hold her responsible. She wasn't kidding when she said her "father" and uncles' reputation was so bad they've been dragged into shit. "How do you know I'm not blessed enough to be a demigod? Regardless. We're still a pain. Just. For different reasons." she reassured. "But, I must thank you. For staying calm enough to hear us out. And to have a sliver of trust in us. I know it's not easy to trust strangers, especially in a panicked state. Believe me. I have to admit I have a lot of respect for all of you guys for being able to pull that off. Especially with your wives and children." Jess was insanely bad with trust, and when it came to her family? Forget about it, there was a time not trusting someone or someones could have ruined her life.

Leo offered a small smile, finally dropping his own walls. A little. "Honestly, it's their trust in you that kept me calm. I'm...not so sure i would have listened if they hadn't been there."

Raph snorted and rolled his eyes "Oh yeah. He tends to hit first and ask questions later where Vicky is concerned." Leo just shrugged his agreement.

"Like you are any better." Donnie deadpanned at Raph, which earned him a glare, that he ignored.

Mikey raised a ridge, fully understanding the trust thing. How careful did they have to be in their lives? He chose to drop that touchy line of conversation. Each built trust in their own way. "You say your dads are gods...it doesn't take much to make the connection." He was now very comfortable in his chair, and also leaning dangerously far back. "Besides, demigods are still gods. Just lesser gods."

"Well, god dad doesn't necessarily mean god mom, but I see where you're coming from." her green/blue eyes turned to the red banded turtle. "Meh, if it makes you guys feel better I already know a ton of people like that." her entire family, cousins, sister, and said mates of family.

Speak of the devils by the way, Ariel was strolling in, Starblast, Clayshah, Inferna, tailing her, she was holding something in her hands, a homemade container full of solvent. "Ratchet is checking up on stuff and should be in pretty quickly."

"Why are you up and walking around? Where is Aquarius?" Jessica decided to give the gig up, the turtles and their family weren't like a regular nest team they were working with for a day, and never seeing again, this might be a bit more long termed.

"Couldn't sleep. Especially in the medbay like that. Aqua on the other hand passed thee HELL out." Ariel or bailey, she nodded at her leader as a heads up before tossing her the solvent.

"Ah. Guys? These three are my cousins. Clayshah, Ariel, Inferna, and that is my sister: Starblast"

Leo nodded his greeting, watching them all with probing eyes as he stayed carefully near his mate. Force of habit placing his body between them and Vicky. "My brothers: Raphael, Donatello and Michelangelo."

"Hi!" Ariel beamed at them like nothing happened at all, she is the best with people out of all of them, she's the least violent and easy going to be honest. But man you cross her in any way, especially when it comes to family or innocent people, she will destroy you and everything you love. Twice.

Clayshah simply nodded respectively in greeting, she is far more reserved and stand offish, she doesn't know how to "people" to put it lightly.

Mikey eyeballed Ariel/Baily a moment. Then "Sorry i sat on you."

Inferna got a total kick out of that from behind Ariel, releasing a large puff of air as laughter muffled by her hand.

Ariel scoffed at Inferna in more of a: "bitch like you have any room to freaking talk, oh my shit~"

"Yeah Yeah. Laugh it up. Though I did think you were a Geo considering how deep in the earth you were at one point. She smiled innocently at Inferna/Maranda whose shoulder sagged a bit as the wind was stolen from her sails. The air pusher smirked, then looked at Mikey "It's all good, to be honest I got a pretty good laugh out of it later on." See? Easy going, a lot of air pushers of the species were, the more philosophical ones.

"Alright. I give you that one..." Inferna was still brooding, shocker, a being of fire still acting salty.

"I'll need to start an energon IV for the ladies. That'll help them recover faster." Yup, straight to the point as Clayshah/Carrie was doing that thing of narrowing her eyes while thinking, and of course clicking her tongue, that was her thinking face.

Donnie's thinking face was a scrunched nose that made his eyes bug out more behind his glasses. Which he was doing now as he walked over. "They can tolerate it?"

Clayshah was first distracted in the retort her cousin gave, slight delayed reaction, giving her a high five. "Burn.. And to answer your question, Donatello, our race had to survive off of energon for a very long time. We had to put additives in it to get the proper nutrients, but our bodies are more evolved than earth humans. Even the ones that weren't blessed by Gods drank it. And when you have a core or entity of any type. An energy source like that becomes vital, or a means of a recovery" She explained with a little nod.

"Interesting." Donnie pushed his glasses up on his nose. "Would you mind if I watched and gather information on this? I have a feeling I'm going to have to expand my field of expertese now."

Shortly after you had Ratchet walking in with Perceptor, First Aid, and Jolt, he immediately started clicking at Clayshah in Cybertronian rapidly

Clayshah felt the need to take a sassy posture looking up at her partner of the medbay, with a hand on her hip, and raised a brow "Ratch, I don't know. I just got here. Yeesh."

Raph was giving them all his signature glare at that. "It'd be nice if we could understand what you are babbling about. I mean, it's not like it's our wives passed the fuck out in here and we'd like to know what's going on or anything."

"Force of habit Raphael." Ratchet said casually, as he looked through some medical records, urging his colleagues to get started, the med bots and scientists spread out and start to get to work. He was well aware of Raph's temper, and chose to ignore it at the moment. Was too busy to get a wrench out.

Jessica spread her wings and took off to search the cabinets for a bucket and towels, easily maneuvering around despite the fact her wings were massive.

Mikey was watching her in undisguised wonder, right up until Caitlin whimpered and a look of pain crossed his features and he toppled backwards in his chair, hitting the floor hard.

Raph was immeadiately on the move, concern showing on his face. "Mikey!"

With his larger brother's help, Mikey sat up. His eyes wide as saucers as he stared at Caitlin. "I...felt that..." Now he was looking around in confusion. "She's hurting...and I felt it..."

Jessica watched the confused turtle, a small smile on her lips. "You have a bond now. YOur mates can feel you, and you them. Even in your Dragon forms, that's how they snapped you out of it without removing the tech."

"Oooooooooh..." Now Mikey had that look of wonder on his face as he stared at Caitlin.

"Out of curiosity. How much do you guys remember?" Clayshah was nonchalant and made sure not to be too pushy, it would probably be better on their psyche to not remember, and she truly did wish that for them.

Leo shook his head as he thought. "Not everything." he reached out his hand and picked up Vicky's, his thumb stroking the back of her hand lightly as his voice lowered. "I tried to fight it and was able to catch a few glimpses of things. But there is so much I don't remember."

Mikey was nodding his agreement as he righted his chair back up. "Yeah, just flashes here and there." He sat back down, but was very careful to keep all the chair legs on the floor. "But I...do remember our fights more than...the other times. Though they are blurry too." He was now focused on Caitlin, that wonder still in his eyes as he began to stroke her blonde hair.

"We gathered that much. You were actually able to snap out of it a few times. Did you happen to know what Bishop was planning?" Bre/Starblast was watching the blue banded turtle thoughtfully, one of her wings twitching.

It was Donnie who answered her though. "Yes...and no. He was very smug about the fact he caught us and hinted very strongly that we were only one step to something bigger. He's learning I think. He was very careful not to fully fill us in on what."

"Probably because we've managed to slip from his fingers one too many times." Raph groused. "He's learned to keep his trap shut."

"For the most part anyway." Donnie agreed "He still had to rub it in just because he could."

Starblast looked at them thoughtfully and shrugged "More than what we used to know. We'll figure everything out. One thing at a time though. We've worked off of far less"

"Imma kill that guy..." Ariel said. Hey, someone crossed her, she was in revenge mode.

For the countless time, Leo's jaw tightened again, and Lavi began to fear for teeth, while his free hand grasped the headrail, and began to bend it. The words came out in a furious, harsh, growl. "He was already supposed to be dead."

Lavi stepped closer, and gently pried his hand from the still bending rail. "Stop. You are going to gouge our hand open on the metal. Think of something calming to do."

The family patriarch closed his eyes and took a deep breath in before letting it slowly back out. When they opened again, they settled on the still bloody wings. "Someone show me how to clean them...please... I can't stand to look at them like that anymore." But he was now brave enough to touch them, his hand reaching out to gently caress the new appendages. "They are soft..."

"Sorry, got distracted" Jessica got the buckets and several rags, a sheepish posture, she got distracted very easy sometimes. She flew down and put some of the solvent into the buckets and put some water in them then set a bucket it by each turtle, with a few rags. "It's easy, especially with the solvent. Get the rag wet and go into the direction of their feathers. If you don't it feels awkward, sometimes tickles. She might twitch her wings when you touch them, she's just not used to them yet. And if she coos that is normal too"

"What about their healing capabilities?" Donnie asked. "Will it interfere with their more advanced healing the mutagen gave them?"

Clayshah shook her head "our bodies are very adaptable. Even when we do something like go to live on another planet. The rate we were able to adapt to the atmosphere was quite unexpected. Of course we'll keep an eye on them just in case. But any troubles between the mixed DNA should be resolved by now. Passing out like they did is completely normal."

"Interesting. What else has changed in them?"

"They have wings!" Mikey happily chirped.

"Besides the wings, you dip." Donnie wasn't really in the mood to deal with Mikey's shenanigans right now. It was more important to him that he learn.

"Just about everything." Clayshah replied. "Their bone density, their physical strength, their recovery, even their skin is thicker. Our species was a warrior class race. The wing sabers, what they have turned into, were protectors, they served people, and would fight off anything, spiritual or any force the humans couldn't fight. Photo pretty much turned them into super soldiers. Only thing that isn't strong right now is their wings. They are still tough, but being so new they are soft. They are a lot like hands, while there's are like baby hands, ours are tough and callused from harsh use, but very sensitive to touch still"

"Oh yeah, we've beaten ours to the point we can deflect gun fire off of them" Inferna was proud of that fact it appeared.

"Ha!" Mikey grinned "We can do that with our shells."

Inferna laughed a little at Mikey "Useful shit, am I right?"

Ratchet was putting the datapads down now, and pulling out machinery to do a deep scan, using Donatello as his target "Primus. That technology is biological. It was continuing to grow along your spine" he looked at Perceptor "we can't remove it without damaging their spinal column."

Jessica shrugged "Repair it as you go along."

"it's not that simple! There is bone, nerves, discs!" Ratchet reasoned

"You use stem cell methods to grow them more bone, copy nerve frequencies."

"Both of you, over here now. We'll need your help, you have weapon advancements in organic healing."

"Just organic healing?" Clayshah did that little innocent/not so innocent looking smile only short people of 4'9 are capable of pulling off.

"You will never let me live that down that Elemental tech is more advanced…. Will you…." It wasn't a question, Ratchet knew better.

"Woah what? Why me?" Jess asked, she was a soldier, leader, and worked on cars and heavy equipment. Which is not medical equipment. Not even close.

"Just do it." Jessica's earth cousin dragged her to Ratchet and his team.

Donnie watched this exchange, then facepalmed. "Well, isn't this great. going to get paralyzed while you try and get it out."

"Dude!" mikey's face actually looked panicked. "Don't say shit like that! I'd go nuts if i couldn't ride my board!"

"We'll find a way around it. Calm down" Clayshah's voice came from the other side of the medbay.

Raph rolled his eyes at her.

Leo just tuned it all out, his attention firmly focused on his new task. Cleaning those wings. He was careful, meticulous. he didn't want to hurt her or aggrevate her wings in anyway. This was all still so new to him. Even as careful as he was, he had to stop, a very surprised ridge shooting up when a long, soft, moan slipped out of her. A sound he usually only heard in the bedroom. This, was not a coo. A coo was a content, happy sound. Not a sound that indicated that Vicky needed a bedroom exercise regimen.

Mikey bust out laughing at Leo's expression. "Might need to get a separate room there bro."

In turn the remaining NEST girls snickered, being able to relate, except Inferna, she was all grumbling "Heatwave did that to me in public on purpose one time. Lil bastard"

"Ha!" Ariel grinned "That is totally something he would do." Apparently that statement earned a seal of approving from the wind flinger.

"Yeah, when she said they are sensitive to touch? She really meant it. And it does. It feels nicer than when someone plays with your hair, even better than when someone massages your back! It can go from soothing to heated very quickly. So have caution with your touch" Starblast informed, laughing a little

"Yeah. It's embarassing to coo in public, not being able to control it" Well, it was for the flame girl.

Leo just shook his head slightly, then continued on unpreturbed.

"Nothing phases him." Mikey chuckled.

"That's a good way to be." Starblast noted with a smile. "You guys probably see a lot. And it won't get any more normal working with us if we are going to try to figure out what Bishop is doing.

It was about then the younger turtles came back, all of them loaded down with comfort items not only for their mothers, but their fathers as well. Leo was especially pleased to see his tea kettle in Ty's hand.

"Whoa, full house in here." Ari noted even has her bouncy steps led her towards her parents. "Whatcha guys doing?"

"Cleaning them up a bit." Mikey took a momet to smile at his daughter before returning to the task of wing sanitizing.

"Cool, can I help?" Mikey nodded and Ari picked up her own rag before peering around Mikey, then smiled. "Why am I not surprised..."

Lavi walked over curiously, and her smile mirrored Ari's. "Orange. Mom's are blue."

The Elementals withdrew to the lab section of medbay, allowing the turtles the time and somewhat privacy needed to clean the wings, and to reestablish connections. Ty and Lavi moved in to help their father. Talking quietly to him while their mother slept on. Lavi in particular hung close to Leo, the scare of him having been taken still fresh in her mind and she needed that reassurance that he was indeed here. And Leo, smiling gently at her, gave her that reassurance. Now that she was carrying her own little one, Leo would take extra precautions with her to make sure her pregnancy was as stress free as possible as could be expected from this lifestyle.

He was still going to have words with Kyle though. Lengthy ones.


End file.
